Forms of arbitration agreement

Under Article 18.4 of Law on Commercial Arbitration, arbitration agreement is invalid if its form is incompliant with Article 16 of this Law. Thus, in case the arbitration agreement does not comply with the regulations on the form, it shall be invalid.
Under Article 16 of Law on Commercial Arbitration, arbitration agreement shall exist in one of the two form, as follows:
- A clause in the contract: The parties agree to choose arbitration to settle disputes in the contract. For example: Company A and company B sign a rice purchase contract, in Article 23 of this contract, indicating: "Any dispute related to this contract will be resolved by the Arbitration Center".
- An independent agreement: the parties do not state the provision on dispute settlement by arbitration in the contract but state this agreement in an independent document which is knows as arbitration agreement for the contract signed before. For instance, Company A and Company B above signed an agreement on dealing with disputes in arbitration center for any problems arising from rice trading contracts between the two companies mentioned above.
Besides, arbitration agreements shall not exist in the form of words or acts but shall be in the form of documents, including:
- Agreement made through communication between the parties by telegram, fax, telex, email or other forms provided for by law;
- Agreement made through exchange of written information between the parties;
- Agreement recorded in writing by a lawyer, notary public or competent institution at the request of the parties:
- In their transactions, the parties make reference to a document such as a contract, document, company charter or other similar documents which contains an arbitration agreement;
- Agreement made through exchange of petitions and self-defense statements which reflect the existence of an agreement proposed by a party and not denied by the other party.