Pietro Cingolani SAS v. Pearl Marin Shipping A/B (The General Valdes) - Court of Appeal (Lord Denning M.R., Ackner L.J. and Sir Denys Buckley) - 21 May 1981

Arbitration - Whether reasons for award formed part of the award

The parties had submitted a charterparty dispute to arbitration. The arbitrators disagreed and an umpire was appointed. The umpire’s award was sent to one of the arbitrators in the same envelope as a separate document headed “Reasons for Award”. In the Court of Appeal both parties acknowledged that there was an error of law in the “Reasons for Award” relating to the question of damages. The appellants wanted the umpire to reconsider this question, but, since this was a pre-1979 Act arbitration and neither party had asked for a special case to be stated, the only ground on which this could be done was if the award contained an error on the face of the record. Normally, the arbitrator or umpire would insert in the “Reasons for Award” a disclaimer saying that the reasons did not form part of the award. In the present case, however, the “Reasons for Award” contained no such disclaimer.