Why Mediations Fail, and What You Can Do About It

In August 2019, India was among the first group of countries to sign the Singapore Convention on Mediation, a treaty meant to make settlements reached through international mediation easier to enforce across borders. Four years later, Parliament passed the Mediation Act, 2023. On paper, mediation in India has never had more support.

Yet plenty of mediations still end without a deal. Both sides turn up, spend a few hours in separate rooms, and leave with a report that says no settlement was reached. Why does that keep happening?

Usually it is not because the dispute could never be settled. It is because of things that went wrong before anyone sat down.

The Wrong Person Is in the Room

This is the most common problem, and the easiest to fix. A company sends a manager who can listen and take notes but cannot agree to anything above a small figure. The other side makes a reasonable offer, and the answer is that it will have to go to the board. By the time the board meets, the moment has passed. Send someone who can say yes.

Everyone Treats It Like a Hearing

Mediation is not a trial. The mediator has no power to decide who is right and cannot impose a settlement on either party. Yet many parties walk in with an opening statement built to win an argument. That approach makes sense in front of a judge. In mediation it mostly hardens the other side.

A better opening explains what your business needs from the outcome. That is often different from what you claimed in the legal notice, and the gap between the two is where most settlements are found.

Nobody Brought the Documents

A mediator can only help the parties test their positions if the facts are on the table. When invoices, correspondence and delivery records are missing, every session turns into a debate about what happened rather than what to do next. Bring what supports your case, and be prepared to share it.

People Worry About What They Say

Some parties hold back because they fear their words will be used against them in court later. The Mediation Act addresses this directly. It treats mediation communications as confidential, bars audio and video recording of the sessions, and says what is said there cannot be used as evidence in later court or arbitration proceedings, with a few narrow exceptions. Knowing that tends to loosen things up.

The Process Drags

Under the Act, a mediation is meant to finish within 120 days of the mediator’s first appearance, and the parties can extend that by up to 60 days if they agree. Long gaps between sessions kill momentum. So does the difficulty of getting senior people from different cities into one room on the same day.

This is where going online helps. Section 30 of the Act allows mediation to be conducted online with the parties’ written consent, as long as the integrity and confidentiality of the process are protected. If scheduling is your biggest obstacle, it is worth seeing how an online mediation platform in India runs joint and private sessions, shares documents and keeps the record secure. Shorter, more frequent sessions are much easier to arrange when nobody has to travel.

What a Good Outcome Looks Like

When mediation works, the parties sign a settlement agreement, and the Act makes that agreement enforceable in the same way as a court decree. It can be challenged only on limited grounds such as fraud, corruption or impersonation, and the challenge has to be filed within 90 days. Some provisions of the Act came into force in stages, so it is worth checking which ones apply to your dispute.

Not every mediation will end in a deal, and some should not. But if yours fails, make sure it fails on the merits and not because the right person stayed back at the office.

About The Author

Aditya Aryan is a lawyer and mediator. He is currently building marketing at Sama, India’s leading online dispute resolution institution.