Perspectives: Pre-Award Challenge to a Party-Selected Arbitrator

[Editor's note: John Pitblado is an associate with Jorden Burt, LLP, in the firm's Washington, D.C. office. This article, which originally appeared in Jorden Burt's reinsurance and arbitration blog, www.ReinsuranceFocus.com, does not constitute legal or other professional advice or service by Jorden Burt LLP and/or its attorneys.]

Typically in arbitration clauses requiring a three-member panel of arbitrators, each party gets to make a unilateral pick of one arbitrator, with some procedure for selecting a third. Questions often arise as to: (1) what extent a party may challenge its opponent's selection of an arbitrator in tri-partite arbitrations; and (2) whether such …