Challenge to an arbitrator: who acts for the party in Czech
A CFO tracking an arbitration seated in Prague sees a challenge filed against the presiding arbitrator two weeks before the merits hearing. The tribunal's composition is now open to question, and every step taken while the challenge is pending risks being redone once it is decided.
A challenge to an arbitrator is raised by the party itself, or by its counsel where represented, and filed with the arbitral institution under its rules or, absent one, with the competent Czech court under the Arbitration Act. The deadline is short and peremptory, running from when the party learned of the ground, not from the tribunal's constitution.
Who acts for the party, and where the challenge is filed
Standing belongs to the party to the arbitration agreement, not to a third party affected by the outcome. Where the party is represented, the challenge is filed by counsel on the party's instruction; where it is not, the party files in its own name. The forum depends on how the arbitration is organised.
An institutional arbitration routes the challenge to the institution's own body under its rules – the Arbitration Court attached to the Czech Chamber of Commerce and Agricultural Chamber handles challenges this way for proceedings under its rules. An ad hoc arbitration, with no institution to decide the point, routes the challenge to the competent Czech court, which then rules on the arbitrator's continued participation.
A party abroad follows the same route through its Czech counsel; nothing in the Arbitration Act shifts the forum because the challenging party sits outside the Czech Republic. What changes is the time the instruction chain takes to move the file, which is why the deadline below is the operative constraint, not the venue.
While a challenge is pending, a party sometimes needs protection that cannot wait for the tribunal's composition to be settled – an interim measure such as a preliminary injunction, for instance because assets are moving. What a request for a preliminary injunction must contain before a Czech court will act on it is a separate filing, decided on its own papers, and it does not pause or accelerate the challenge itself.
Where the arbitration agreement's jurisdiction clause is silent on which institution decides a challenge, that question is sometimes disputed before the challenge itself can even be reached.
What must accompany the challenge – the document set
A challenge that arrives without its supporting file is treated as incomplete on the papers, and incomplete filings lose time rather than gain it. The set below is what the institution or the court needs to rule without asking the party to supplement.
- The written challenge stating the specific ground – bias, lack of independence, or a qualification the arbitration agreement requires
- The instrument showing when the party learned of the ground, or an explanation of why it could not have known earlier
- A copy of the arbitration agreement or jurisdiction clause invoked, and the institutional rules the parties adopted
- Any correspondence, disclosure, or public record supporting the ground raised
- A power of attorney where the party is represented
- A certified translation of any document not drafted in the language of the proceedings
A challenge grounded in a fact the party could have discovered earlier – rather than one it only just learned – is the single most common reason a challenge fails before the deadline is even reached.
The deadline and what interrupts it
The Arbitration Act sets a short peremptory period running from when the party became aware, or should have become aware, of the ground for the challenge. Missing it is not a formality that can be cured later; a late challenge is one the institution or court will not consider on its merits at all.
A CFO whose party learns of a conflict of interest mid-hearing faces one situation, one step, and one deadline: on learning the fact, counsel drafts the challenge citing the specific ground, and files it with the institution or the court within the period the Act sets – there is no separate notice period that resets the clock, and continuing to participate in the hearing without raising the point can itself be read as a waiver.
Nothing interrupts this deadline except the moment of actual or constructive knowledge shifting. A party that suspects a ground but waits for corroborating documents before filing runs the real risk of filing too late; the safer sequence is to file on the suspicion and supplement the file afterwards, where the rules of the forum permit it.
Why a challenge is rejected on the papers
Most rejected challenges fail for one of three reasons: the ground is not one the Act or the institutional rules recognise as disqualifying, the deadline has passed, or the party continued to participate in the proceedings after the ground became known without reserving its position.
A review of the file before a challenge is filed can establish what the record shows about when a fact became known and what correspondence exists on the point – it cannot establish what the tribunal or the institution will decide is a disqualifying ground, and no report predicts that outcome.
In one file we reviewed, a party abroad had raised concerns about an arbitrator's prior professional contact with opposing counsel only after an adverse procedural ruling – months after the contact had been disclosed in the tribunal's own filings. The challenge was rejected as untimely; the underlying concern, however documented, could not overcome a deadline that had already run.
What happens after the ruling
Where the challenge succeeds, the arbitrator is replaced under the mechanism the arbitration agreement or the institutional rules provide, and the tribunal – reconstituted – decides whether any prior procedural steps need to be repeated. Where it fails, the arbitration continues with the same tribunal, and the ground raised can resurface only at the stage of setting aside the eventual award, on narrower terms.
A failed challenge is not necessarily wasted – raising and losing it on the record can matter later if the same ground is argued again at the award stage, though the standard applied there is stricter.
For a party weighing whether Prague is the right seat before a dispute even starts, the underlying question is broader than any single challenge: what arbitration seated in Prague changes for a foreign counterparty covers the seat-level choices a challenge procedure sits inside. A party enforcing or defending against a UK counterparty works from a different record entirely – see what the UK court and enforcement sources actually show for that separate set of registers.
Frequently asked questions
What does challenge to an arbitrator cost in time?
The filing itself is short to prepare once the ground is documented, but the peremptory deadline is the real constraint, not the drafting time. A late challenge is not considered on its merits regardless of how strong the ground is.
Which form is used?
There is no fixed statutory form. The challenge is a written submission stating the ground and the moment of knowledge, filed under the institution's rules or, for ad hoc arbitration, as a court filing under the Arbitration Act.
Is a representative required?
Not as a matter of law before the institution or in most court filings of this kind, but a party abroad almost always instructs counsel to manage translation, deadlines, and the document set described above.
What if the party is abroad?
The forum and the deadline do not change because the party sits outside the Czech Republic. What changes is the time needed to instruct counsel and assemble documents and evidence abroad, including certified translations – which is why the deadline should be treated as running from day one, not from when the file physically reaches the Czech Republic.
LISTINA produces factual reports from documents and public registers. It does not provide legal advice and does not represent parties. Where a matter requires representation before a Czech court or authority, it is handled by a collaborating advocate.
A challenge decided against the party after the hearing has already run is a step that cannot be undone by a later, stronger filing. A factual report on what the arbitration file and any related court record show – the ground documented, the dates on record, and what correspondence exists on the point – is prepared as a defined, bounded piece of work; write to info@listinafirm.com to scope it against your file.