Mediation must be seen as a direct or indirect alternative to litigation, taking into account the relative cost of these two options and their respective probabilities of satisfaction.
The opportunity cost/benefit of mediation is measured taking into account:
– the apparent and hidden costs of legal proceedings for one to three years, or even longer:
- lawyers’ fees,
- expert appraisal fees (financial or other),
- direct and indirect internal management costs for the parties (legal departments, operational contributors, even general management),
- intangible costs (reputation, etc.) which are difficult to assess.
– the amount of the net judgment obtained or suffered, depending on the case, by the parties in the event of a court decision, i.e.:
(amount of claims – costs of legal proceedings) x probability of success/failure.
Conversely, in the case of inter-company mediation:
– the duration is 14 hours on average (source: CMAP), bearing in mind that the duration depends on the complexity of the case, including the number of parties involved,
– the cost is shared between the parties.
The fees in the case of #Mediation3.0 are:
– invoiced according to the time spent, at an overall hourly rate that varies notably according to the human and technical complexity of the case but also the number of parties involved,
– possibly invoiced in lump-sum stages if the nature of the case allows,
– shared between the parties, unless they agree otherwise.