Several different grounds can give rise to Business disputes in Washington. Often, businesses will disagree over the exact meaning of terms found in contracts or prior oral agreements. Billing issues and property matters also commonly form grounds for disagreements between businesses.

What to Do in a Business Dispute?

If you are involved in a business dispute in Tumwater, Washington you should first review all relevant documents, including past and current contracts. These documents might contain clauses that dictate how and where you should handle a dispute. However, the dispute might need to be taken to court if contracts do not have resolution clauses, or if there are no documents relevant to the dispute. Washington courts look to the individual cases in determining the best resolution. Where two parties have not agreed beforehand on how to handle a dispute, a specific set of legal principles is used instead. Each state has different business laws about dispute resolution and contract law. An Lawyer practicing in Tumwater can help you handle your dispute in accordance with the applicable Washington laws. With an attorney's knowledge of the law, the parties of a dispute might be able to avoid going to court entirely, since negotiations often proceed more smoothly with representation.

Alternative Dispute Resolution

Disagreements in contracts must often be resolved outside of court according to a dispute resolution clause. Methods of resolving a conflict outside of court are called Alternative Dispute Resolution or ADR. These methods include Mediation, Arbitration and Collaboration. ADR makes going to court unnecessary, because it is designed to reach the same result that a court would have. Still, some methods of ADR entail their own formal procedures, most enlisting a third party to determine a dispute based on local law just as a judge would do. An attorney experienced with ADR in Tumwater can counsel you through the process if your business dispute is to be resolved by ADR.