Article by Rod S. Attride-Stirling and Jai Cedenio
Introduction
In Bermuda, there exist two separate legal regimes for arbitration:
- The Arbitration Act 1986- applies to domestic arbitrations ie. those arbitrations that are not within the scope of Art.1 of the Model Law.
- The Bermuda International Conciliation and Arbitration Act 1993 ("BICA'93) - enacts the UNCITRAL Model law and applies to any "international commercial arbitration" held in Bermuda, unless the parties agree otherwise. S29 allows for the parties to opt out of BICA'93 by agreement.
The text of the Model law can be found in Schedule 2 of Part III of the Act.
An advantage of BICA'93 over '86 Act is that arbitral awards obtained under BICA'93 are not as prone to judicial review as in the case of awards under the '86 Act, albeit leave of the court is required to challenge an award under the '86 Act. The finality of an award is one of the characteristics that entices parties to arbitration- no one wants to be
