If you choose an informal arbitration you will usually have to accept the outcome whether you like it or not.

In Reward Ventures 01 CC v Walker the arbitration agreement provided that the arbitration must be held “in a summary manner … on the basis that it shall not be necessary to observe or carry out either … the usual formalities of procedure; or the strict rules of evidence … The arbitrator shall decide the matters submitted to him according to what he considers just and equitable in the circumstances and therefore the strict rules of law need not be observed or be taken into account by him in arriving at his decision”.

If you choose an informal arbitration you will usually have to accept the outcome.

On this wording the arbitrator was not obliged to furnish an award embodying reasons for the decision nor was he obliged to give reasons afterwards when requested to do so by the parties.  A complaint that he had not dealt with the counterclaim was rejected because the counterclaim was mentioned in the award.

The matter went through three courts in a dispute over about R246 000.  It must have cost more than that in legal costs.