Mediation is often touted as the panacea for dispute resolution. It's not, and it suffers a bit from idol worship. I'm a mediation evangelist myself, but it's just a tool and it has many limits.
Bombthrowers and lapdogs are the perjoratives usually flung in a fight among franchisees like that described in today's article on the Choice Hotel Advisory Council.
The alarms that sound about arbitration for franchisees are nonsense. They are built on unexamined anecdotes or examples of bad lawyering or they mistake the exception for the rule.
So if the dispute resolution system is broke in terms of serving franchise businesses, why can't we make it faster and cheaper? One easy target is lawyers.
Congress just passed a bill to allow terminated auto dealers to arbitrate their termination under an expedited procedure. The procedure highlights the issue of faster, cheaper, that I've been discussing.
This will be a blog about best practices for resolving franchise disputes. I'm professionally interested in this as I've been a trial lawyer representing franchisors, franchisees, and franchisee associations for 25 years, and I've been a mediator for 20 years.
