Adjudicator bias can really hit you where it hurts - even if you did not actually seek to persuade the adjudicator to be biased and even if there is no evidence that he was in fact biased. It's all about a "real possibility of bias", an issue that came to the fore in the case of Amec vs Whitefriars. The basic facts are that Whitefriars engaged Amec by a letter of intent in October 2000. Work on site commenced in May 2001 and three months later, when the parties could not agree on a second stage tender, Whitefriars determined the letter of intent. Amec had then been paid―204,000 and invoiced for a further ―500,000, which had not been paid. On the face of it, it is disputes of this size and type that adjudication was designed to resolve.
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