A recent case concerning both implied actual authority and ostensible authority shows the importance of claimants serving arbitration notices by all applicable means

By
Lewis Moore, Toby Miller, Chris Primikiris and Beatrice Cameli, Hill Dickinson,

The Court of Appeal has held, in the rare circumstances of the Sino Channel Asia Limited -v- Dana Shipping and Trading PTE Singapore and another [2017] EWCA CIV 1703 case, that a third party company had both implied actual authority and ostensible authority to accept notice of arbitration.

The Court of Appeal held that a third party company had both implied actual authority and ostensible authority to accept notice of arbitration

From around 2009, Sino had an arrangement with a third party Chinese company, BX, to provide services related to back-to-back sale and purchase agreements, concluded in the name of Sino, with BX handling the entire operational side and Sino handling the financial (letter of credit) side of the transactions. The agreements contained detailed notice provisions clearly directing that all notices and communications had to be sent or served on Sino at its address in Hong Kong. 

The disputed question was whether service of Dana’s notice of arbitration on BX was effective, giving rise to three principal issues