Originally from World Arbitration and Mediation Review (WAMR) 

There is a general consensus within the international arbitration community that the parties can agree to proceed with a remote hearing unless expressly prohibited by national law.  After all, the touchstone of international arbitration is the parties’ agreement.  Thus, where both parties agree to proceed with a remote hearing, there is little risk that either party will be able to rely on the fact that the hearing was remote as a basis for challenging or resisting enforcement of a final award.   Such an agreement should operate as a waiver of any such issues. 

Similarly, when both parties agree that they do not want to proceed with a remote hearing, the tribunal can take comfort in the fact that the decision to adjourn the hearing on a wait-and-see basis is unlikely to provide an effective ground to challenge or resist the enforcement of a final award.   Here again, the parties’ agreement should work as a waiver of such an argument.

What happens, however, when one party objects to proceeding with a remote hearing; does the tribunal have the authority to order a remote hearing over the one party’s objection? In this paper, we analyze the tribunal’s inherent authority under the Model Law  and demonstrate that absent an express prohibition on remote hearings in the arbitration agreement, institutional rules or the applicable national law(s),  the tribunal has the requisite authority to order a remote hearing over a party’s objection.