Another mediation for me looms. I am busy contacting the parties to get things ready for the mediation session itself.

In the UK it takes up to £20,000 to take a not especially complicated case to a final verdict in court.

Just say you are being sued for £50,000 over a business venture which went wrong. Your personal conscience is clear, but you do wonder if your employees might not have been a bit over-zealous and/or misleading in dealing with the customer who is now the plaintiff.

If you fight the case in court and you lose, you’ll have to pay your own costs plus some two-thirds of the winner’s costs. Not to mention any damages the judge awards.

So if you think that there is a reasonable chance that on the merits you are going to lose, it will pay you to offer at least £10,000 to cut your losses and avoid the costs/hassle of struggling on with the litigation.

On the other hand, a plaintiff too will not enjoy the stress and uncertainty of a protracted legal battle. Even if the odds of winning look overwhelming at 90%, would you go on a train if one in ten trains exploded?

A good mediator is paid by the parties to help them discreetly cut a deal they can both live with, and stop the process before the costs and worry escalate alarmingly for both sides. The earlier the parties accept mediation, the cheaper (and maybe more personally satisfactory) the outcome is likely to be for both of them.

Mediation is often called ‘alternative dispute resolution’.

That’s the wrong way round. The ‘alternative’ dispute resolution mechanism of last resort should be litigation, as it is just too expensive and unpredictable.

So, I am available to help you sort out those ghastly disputes, big or small. Hire me.