Hanscomb CEO, Sean Gibbs has passed the FIDIC Credentialing assessment to become a Certified FIDIC Adjudicator.
A FIDIC Certified Adjudicator is someone with expert knowledge of the FIDIC Standard Forms of Contract with experience, knowledge and ability to act impartially and independently as an Adjudicator on Dispute Boards under these forms and/or any contracts based on them.
The credentialing process is overseen by the governance board which comprises Sir Vivian Ramsey, Anthony Barry, Lady Julia Brown, Dr. Nelson Ogunshakin, Gregs Thomopulos and Professor John Uff CBE QC and the certification board which comprises John Boyd, Ron Watermeyer, Bayo Adeola, Stephane Giraud, Vincent Leloup, Husni Madi, Salvador P. Castro, Jr., Lindy Patterson QC, Henry Musonda, Tian Feng, Hu Zhangxi, Cosmin Tobolcea, Jomanah Al Btoush, Chendong Zhang and Michele Kruger.
Sean said:
It is a real honour and privilege to have qualified to take the assessment let alone pass, I qualified as a barrister and the demanding examination process by FIDIC that tested contractual knowledge across the entire FIDIC suite, demanding oral and written assessments and knowledge of civil and common law jurisprudence really was much harder by way of comparison. As a serving adjudicator and dispute board member this qualification will help distinguish me in the market and give clients the confidence to select me as a Dispute Board Member.
One of FIDIC’s new ‘FIDIC Golden Principles’, which enshrine FIDIC’s core contracting philosophy, provides that “All formal disputes must be referred to a Dispute Avoidance / Adjudication Board (“DAAB”) for a provisionally binding decision as a condition precedent to arbitration.” Parties are therefore discouraged from amending a FIDIC form to state otherwise. As signalled by the name change, the new DAAB differs considerably to the Dispute Adjudication Board (“DAB”) of the 1999 Suite.
– The default position is that all DAABs are ‘standing’, i.e. appointed at the outset of the Contract and throughout its lifetime;
– The Parties may jointly request DAAB assistance in relation to any issue, and the DAAB may also invite the Parties to make such a request;
– The 2017 Suite expressly provides that upon termination of the Contract, the DAAB will expire 28 days after the DAAB has given its decisions on all Disputes referred to it or (if earlier) when the Parties reach final agreement on all matters in connection with the termination;
– A Party may provide a Notice of Dissatisfaction (“NOD”) in relation to part only of a DAAB Decision; that part is then deemed severable from the rest of the DAAB decision and the remainder becomes final and binding to the extent that no NOD is given in respect of it;
– Even if a NOD has been issued, if a Party fails to comply with a DAAB Decision, the winning party under the Decision may refer the losing party’s failure to comply with the DAAB decision directly to arbitration (i.e. without a separate DAAB Decision and amicable settlement period).