Choosing London Arbitration: Is your Award Final and Binding?

London Arbitration Week (LAW)¹, from 1-5 December 2025, has naturally included coverage of the benefits of choosing to refer disputes to arbitration, rather than submitting to the jurisdiction of the courts. These benefits include the privacy of the proceedings, flexibility of the procedure, relative speed of resolution, ability to appoint a tribunal with required industry knowledge or technical expertise and potential costs savings. Another key consideration often will be whether the arbitration award is final and binding.

What is the position under English law?

As a general proposition, under English law, arbitration awards are final and binding unless the arbitration agreement or institutional rules provide otherwise.

Section 58(1) of the Arbitration Act 1996 (the “Act“) provides that “Unless otherwise agreed by the parties, an award made by the tribunal pursuant to an arbitration agreement is final and binding both on the parties and on any persons claiming through or under them“.

What about the LCIA?

This is reinforced by the Rules of the London Court of International Arbitration (“LCIA“), Article 26.8 of which states “Every award (including reasons for such award) shall be final and binding on the parties. The parties undertake to carry out any award immediately and without any delay … and the parties also waive irrevocably their right to any form of appeal, review or recourse to any state court or other legal authority, insofar as such waiver shall not be prohibited under any applicable law”.

Can an award ever be challenged?

There are circumstances in which awards can be challenged, even in LCIA arbitration.

Section 58(2) of the Act provides that the final and binding nature of awards does not affect a party’s right to challenge the award by any available arbitral appeal process or under Part I of the Act, namely:

1. Section 67 –on the grounds of the substantive jurisdiction of the Tribunal.
2. Section 68 –on the basis of serious procedural irregularity.
3. Section 69 – appeal on a point of law.

Section 26.8 of the LCIA Rules does state that the parties “waive irrevocably their right to any form of appeal”. However, this only applies “insofar as such waiver shall not be prohibited under any applicable law”. Section 69(1) of the Act states that “Unless otherwise agreed by the parties, a party to arbitral proceedings may … appeal to the court on a question of law arising out of an award made in the proceedings”. The exclusion of any form of appeal under the LCIA Rules constitutes an agreement between the parties not to appeal to the court on a question of law. In LCIA Arbitration, therefore, there is no right to appeal points of law.

By contrast, Sections 67 and 68 of the Act are mandatory and it is not possible to contract out of their application. Parties to arbitral proceedings, including LCIA arbitration, therefore do have the right to challenge the award in limited circumstances.

How often are London arbitration awards overturned in practice?

Although this may mean that some London arbitration awards are not “final and binding”, the statistics show that such challenges are very rarely successful.

The statistics available from the Commercial Court Report 2023-24² show that, in the legal year 2023-2024:

• There were 24 section 67 applications, of which one was successful (although 13 remained pending as at the date of the report).
• there were 37 section 68 applications, of which no applications were successful (although 20 applications pending as at the date of the report).
• there were 52 section 69 applications, of which 10 had permission granted, and one appeal was successful (although 19 applications awaiting a decision on permission as at the date of the report).

What is the approach of the English Court?

The rarity of successful appeals against arbitration awards reflects a reluctance of the English Court to interfere in arbitration. Arbitration is intended to be a consensual alternative process for resolving disputes and, if parties were easily able to challenge arbitration awards in Court, it would undermine the credibility of the proceedings, as well as lead to delay and increased costs in finally resolving disputes.

The English Court’s reluctance to interfere with the decisions of arbitral tribunals was illustrated in the Supreme Court’s decision in Sharp Corp Ltd v Viterra BV (previously known as Glencore Agriculture BV) [2024] UKSC 14, in which the Supreme Court summarised the “safeguards” that apply to appeals under section 69, including that:

• the requirements of section 69 must be applied consistently with the general principle in section 1(c) that “the court should not intervene except as provided“.
• the question of law does not necessarily need to have been raised with the precision of a construction summons, but it must be a point that was fairly and squarely before the tribunal, whether or not articulated as a question of law.
• the Court’s jurisdiction under section 69 is limited to appeals on questions of law and it has no jurisdiction in relation to errors of fact or power to make its own findings of fact.
• there may be circumstances in which the Court can infer that the tribunal has made a finding of fact, even though not expressly stated in the award, which may involve the Court recognising a finding of the tribunal rather than making a finding of fact itself.

So why choose London arbitration?

The fact that appeals are so rarely successful is also a reflection of the general competence of arbitrators and overall quality and fairness of London arbitration awards, whether institutional, ad hoc or trade arbitrations. The neutrality and impartiality of the English legal system, support of local courts and enforceability of awards, are amongst the reasons why, in a global survey of lawyers and arbitrators earlier this year, London remained the top choice of location for international arbitration.³ The finality of arbitration awards is an important part of why London remains the pre-eminent seat for international arbitration.

Footnotes

1. London Arbitration Week
2. Commercial Court Report 2023-24
3. https://www.whitecase.com/insight-our-thinking/2025-international-arbitration-survey