How to Manage Commercial Arbitration Cases in a Law Firm: A Practical Workflow

Commercial arbitration is now the default forum for construction, energy, banking and shareholder disputes across the GCC. For the law firm running the file, it brings a particular kind of pressure: a fixed procedural timetable set by the tribunal, large volumes of exhibits and expert evidence, hearings that may be in person, remote or both, and costs deposits the client has to fund on time.

Most of what goes wrong in an arbitration file is administrative, not legal. A submission date read from the wrong version of the timetable. An exhibit numbered twice. A witness statement sent to the tribunal before the client approved the final draft. This guide sets out a workflow that prevents those failures, step by step.

This is general guidance on running arbitration files, not legal advice. Procedure depends on the arbitration agreement, the applicable rules — for example the DIAC Arbitration Rules 2022 or the SCCA Arbitration Rules — the law of the seat and the tribunal's own orders. Always work from those documents.

The short answer

To manage a commercial arbitration well: run a full conflict check before you accept the instruction; open one matter that holds every party, document, date and hour; turn the tribunal's procedural timetable into dated, assigned tasks with internal deadlines ahead of the real ones; keep exhibits and submissions in a fixed folder structure with one numbering convention; record time and costs deposits as they happen; and diary the post-award deadlines the day the award arrives.

Step 1: Clear conflicts before you accept

Arbitration conflicts are wider than litigation conflicts. You need to check not only the opposing party but its parent and affiliates, its counsel, the proposed or appointed arbitrators, and key experts and witnesses. A relationship that surfaces later can lead to a challenge, an application to remove counsel, or a ground for attacking the award.

Search every name — individuals and companies — against everyone your firm has dealt with: current and former clients, prospective clients who consulted you and did not instruct you, and parties on other matters. Record the search, its date and the result on the file.

Step 2: Open one matter that holds everything

Open the arbitration as a single matter and record, from day one:

• The forum: the arbitral institution or ad hoc, the seat, the case reference and the rules that apply.
• The parties and their roles: claimant, respondent, the arbitrators, the tribunal secretary if there is one, opposing counsel, experts and witnesses — each with contact details.
• The team: the lead partner, the associates and the paralegals, so everyone knows who owns what.
• The fee arrangement: hourly, fixed, a success element, or a mix.

When the file lives in one place, a new team member can be productive in an hour instead of a week, and nobody has to search three inboxes for the tribunal's latest order.

Step 3: Turn the procedural timetable into dated tasks

The first procedural order — often called Procedural Order No. 1 — fixes the timetable: the statement of claim, the statement of defence, document production, witness statements, expert reports, the reply and rejoinder, and the hearing. It is the most important document in the file after the arbitration agreement.

Convert every date into a task with a named owner, and add an internal deadline several working days before each real one, so drafts reach the partner and the client in time for review — and, where the arbitration is in English and the evidence is in Arabic (or the reverse), in time for certified translation. When the tribunal amends the timetable, update every affected task the same day and note which order changed it.

Hearings — the case management conference, procedural hearings and the evidentiary hearing — belong in the firm calendar alongside court dates, with the venue or the remote-hearing details recorded.

Step 4: Keep exhibits and submissions in a fixed structure

Agree a folder structure at the start and never improvise:

• Arbitration agreement and request for arbitration
• Procedural orders and correspondence with the tribunal and the institution
• Submissions (each in its final, filed form)
• Factual exhibits (numbered C-1, C-2… for the claimant, R-1, R-2… for the respondent, or as the tribunal directs)
• Witness statements
• Expert reports
• Document production requests and responses
• Hearing bundles and transcripts
• Costs submissions

Use one numbering convention for the whole case, keep the filed version of every submission separate from drafts, and keep earlier versions rather than overwriting them. When the evidentiary hearing comes, the hearing bundle is assembled from this structure rather than rebuilt from email.

Step 5: Record time and costs as you go

Arbitration fees are often scrutinised twice: by the client, and by the tribunal if costs are claimed. Record time daily, against the matter, with descriptions a tribunal could read — "drafted section 4 of the statement of claim (delay analysis)", not "drafting". At the end of the case, a well-kept time record is the backbone of the costs submission.

Institutions typically ask the parties to pay advances on costs in instalments. Diary each due date, tell the client in writing how much is needed and by when, and record money the client gives you for this purpose in a client funds account, separate from your fees.

Step 6: Prepare the hearing

In the weeks before the evidentiary hearing, the work is logistics: the hearing bundle, the chronology, witness preparation, interpreters if evidence will be given in another language, and — for remote or hybrid hearings — testing the platform with every witness. Assign each of these as a task with a date, so preparation does not depend on one associate remembering everything.

Step 7: Diary the deadlines after the award

The award is not the end of the file. The time limits to challenge an award are short — for example, 30 days from notification of the award under the UAE Federal Arbitration Law (Federal Law No. 6 of 2018) and 60 days under the Saudi Arbitration Law — and enforcement has its own steps and deadlines. Diary them the day the award arrives. For the enforcement stage, see our guide to tracking judgment enforcement.

Confidentiality

Confidentiality is one of the main reasons parties choose arbitration, so treat access to the file as a decision. Limit each file to the people working on it, keep tribunal correspondence out of personal inboxes, and make sure you can show later who opened which document. A tamper-evident audit trail does that with evidence rather than recollection.

Where Smart Legal OS fits

Smart Legal OS is cloud practice management software, in Arabic and English. For an arbitration file it gives you:

• Conflict checks: search a name, company, email or phone across your clients, prospective clients (leads), case parties and opposing parties.
• One case per arbitration, with the team assigned, notes, and related parties recorded with their roles — arbitrators, experts and witnesses included.
• Hearings in the calendar with an automatic email and in-app reminder to the case team 24 hours before, and an in-app reminder about an hour before.
• Tasks with deadlines, assigned to a team member and linked to the case.
• Documents in folders per case and client, with earlier versions kept, and shared with the client through their secure portal.
• Time and billing: timers and manual entries, invoices from time entries, client funds accounts, and card payment in the portal.
• Access by role: junior lawyers and paralegals see only the cases they are assigned to, and the audit trail records activity on cases, documents and invoices.

It does not file with arbitral institutions, run hearings, or number exhibits for you — you keep your exhibit convention, and the system keeps the file in order around it. Plans start at $49 a month with a 14-day free trial and no credit card. See the features or compare the plans.

Frequently asked questions

What is Procedural Order No. 1 in arbitration? It is usually the tribunal's first procedural order, issued after the case management conference. It fixes the procedural timetable, the rules on document production, the format of submissions and the hearing arrangements. Every date in it should become a diary entry with an owner.

How should a law firm number exhibits in an arbitration? Follow the tribunal's direction if there is one. Otherwise a common convention is C-1, C-2… for the claimant's exhibits and R-1, R-2… for the respondent's, with legal authorities numbered separately (CLA-1, RLA-1). The key is one convention for the whole case, never renumbered.

How do you run a conflict check for an arbitration? Search every party, its parent and affiliates, opposing counsel, the arbitrators and key experts and witnesses against your current and former clients, prospective clients and parties on other matters. Record the search and its result on the file before you accept the instruction.

Can arbitration hearing dates and submission deadlines be tracked in practice management software? Yes. Record hearings as calendar events with reminders, and submissions as tasks with deadlines and an owner. Add an internal deadline ahead of each tribunal deadline so drafts can be reviewed and translated in time.

How long do you have to challenge an arbitral award? It depends on the seat. Under the UAE Federal Arbitration Law it is 30 days from notification of the award, and under the Saudi Arbitration Law it is 60 days. Check the current law of the seat and diary the date as soon as the award arrives.