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A dispute in Thailand can be settled in one of four ways: a demand letter and negotiation, mediation, arbitration, or a court case. Mediation works only if both sides agree to it, and it ends in a settlement that both sides sign — a mediator does not decide anything. Arbitration is available only where the parties have a valid arbitration agreement; without one, the dispute goes to a Thai court by default. The right route for your case depends on your contract, what is at stake, and where the other side keeps its money or property.
In short
- Mediation needs both sides' consent and produces a signed settlement, not a ruling.
- Arbitration is only available if your contract — or a separate agreement — provides for it.
- Without an arbitration agreement, a Thai court is the default forum for a civil claim.
- A foreign court judgment is not enforced in Thailand; the claim has to be filed again, and the foreign judgment is used only as evidence.
- A foreign arbitral award has a clearer path: Thailand has applied the New York Convention since 1960, though enforcement still goes through a Thai court petition.
Four routes: from a demand letter to court
A dispute in Thailand can start with a demand letter: one side sets out in writing what it wants and why. A written claim can help both sides settle once they see the figures and the documents laid out, though settlement is not guaranteed. If the other side does not respond, or disputes the claim, four paths open up.
Negotiation stays entirely between the parties. Nobody decides anything for them, and any agreement they reach needs to be properly made to bind them as a contract. If one side later breaks it, the other can go back to the negotiating table, or bring the matter before a court — or, where the parties agreed to arbitrate, before an arbitral tribunal — to have it enforced; a mediator has no power to enforce an agreement.
Mediation brings in a neutral third person who helps the parties talk, but does not rule on who is right. It only happens with both sides' consent, and it ends either in a signed settlement or in nothing at all. Thailand runs two separate mediation tracks, described below: one attached to the courts, and one under a standalone 2019 law.
Arbitration is a private process that produces a binding award, similar to a court judgment. It is only available where the parties have a valid arbitration agreement — either a clause in the original contract or a separate agreement made after the dispute arose. An arbitrator or a panel named under that agreement decides the case, and the losing side can be made to pay through the courts.
Court is where a dispute goes by default if there is no valid arbitration agreement. If mediation is tried and fails, the dispute moves to whichever forum otherwise applies: back to arbitration under a valid agreement, or to court if there is none. A Thai judge decides a case that reaches court, and depending on the type of ruling, the losing side may be able to appeal.
Mediation: court-annexed and private
Thailand has two separate ways to mediate a civil dispute, and foreigners often confuse them.
Mediation through the court. Under an amendment to the Civil Procedure Code that took effect on 7 November 2020, a Thai court can appoint a mediator even before a case is formally filed — but only if the other side agrees to take part. There is no court fee for this stage. If the parties reach an agreement, the court can turn it into a consent judgment, which means it is enforced the same way as any other court order. If mediation fails before a case was filed, you still need to file a claim to take the dispute to court; if the case was already filed, it simply continues as an ordinary lawsuit. Either way, check the applicable time limit for your claim rather than assume nothing is lost by trying mediation first.
Mediation outside the court. The Dispute Mediation Act, in force since 2019, set up a separate system for mediating certain civil disputes without ever filing a case, covering categories such as non-ownership land disputes and disputes between heirs. Which disputes and amounts a given body can handle depends on whether you go to a state agency or a community mediation centre, so check this with the body itself. As with court-annexed mediation, it only goes ahead with both sides' consent, and the outcome is a settlement, not a ruling. If the other side later does not honour the settlement, check straight away whether it can be enforced through the courts and within what time limit.
In both tracks, the mediator's only job is to help the parties reach their own agreement — not to decide who owes what. That makes the wording of the settlement important: a vague or incomplete settlement is harder to enforce later if things go wrong.
Arbitration: when it is available
Arbitration in Thailand is only available where the parties agreed to it — there is no default right to arbitrate a dispute that was never written into a contract. You can include an arbitration clause in a commercial contract between a foreign party and a Thai counterpart for this reason. If yours does not, arbitration is simply not on the table unless the other side later agrees to a separate submission.
Thailand has applied the 1958 New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards since 1960: an award made abroad can, in principle, be enforced in Thailand, and a Thai award can, in principle, be enforced in the many other countries that are also party to the Convention. That is one of the reasons parties choose arbitration when a dispute crosses borders. In practice, enforcement is never automatic — the winning side still has to file a petition with a Thai court, and the losing side can raise defences under the Convention.
Under the Arbitration Act, as Thai law firms describe its sections, a petition to enforce an award must be filed within three years of the award becoming enforceable, and a party that wants to set aside an award made in Thailand must do so within 90 days of receiving it. These are the kind of deadlines that are easy to miss if you are dealing with the dispute from abroad, so we treat them as a priority once a client tells us an award has been issued.
Courts: small claims, civil and specialised courts
If there is no arbitration agreement and mediation has not settled the dispute, a Thai court is the default forum. A claim starts in a court of first instance, which decides both the facts and the law. Whether and on what grounds either side can appeal depends on the type of ruling and the limits the Civil Procedure Code places on appeals; where an appeal is available, it must be filed within one month of the judgment being read out in court. A further appeal to the Supreme Court is not automatic — it needs the Supreme Court's own permission, a rule that has applied since 2015.
Court fees are not fixed sums: as Thai law firms report it, they are calculated as roughly 2% of the amount claimed, capped at THB 200,000 for claims up to THB 50 million. For smaller, more straightforward claims, Thai courts also run a simplified small-claims track under Civil Procedure Code ss. 189–196, with its own lighter procedure; we cover that track, and the money limits that apply to it, in a separate guide once it is published, because the figures involved change the practical advice considerably.
Some disputes have their own specialised route rather than going through an ordinary civil court. A claim about a defective purchase from a business, for instance, can often be brought under the Consumer Case Procedure Act, which has its own simplified rules on fees and shifts the burden of proving certain facts — specifically facts about the goods or service that only the business itself would know — onto the business. If your dispute is with a developer, a condominium juristic person or a landlord, ask us whether a consumer-case route applies before you file in the ordinary court — it can change both the cost and the paperwork.
Thai press has also reported that the Phuket court operates a tourist-facing case division for disputes involving visitors. We have not seen an official description of exactly what it covers, so treat this as something to ask your lawyer about rather than something to rely on in advance.
If the issue is an immigration order rather than a civil dispute — for example a deportation or blacklist decision — it does not go to mediation, arbitration or a civil court at all; it follows its own administrative procedure, covered in our guide to deportation and blacklist rules.
Language, translation and taking part from abroad
Court proceedings run in Thai, under Civil Procedure Code s. 46, and any document in another language that you rely on in court will need a Thai translation ordered by the court. Arbitration is different: the language of proceedings is set by the parties' agreement and the applicable rules, and arbitrations seated in Thailand can be conducted in English, with translation requirements set by the tribunal rather than fixed by law. We tell clients early which documents are likely to need translating, rather than leaving it until a deadline is close.
A bigger practical question for someone who has already left Thailand is whether they have to come back. A Thai lawyer can file a civil claim, respond to one, or pursue arbitration on your behalf under a power of attorney, so filing itself does not require your presence. Whether you must personally attend a hearing is decided by the court or the arbitral tribunal on the facts of the case. We ask the court or tribunal about this directly once a case is underway, rather than assuming either way, and keep clients updated on what has been filed and what is still outstanding.
What a Thai court will not do is simply accept a judgment reached elsewhere. Thailand does not enforce foreign court judgments: if you already have a judgment from your home country against the other side, it is not recognised here on its own — you file the claim again in a Thai court, and the earlier judgment is used as evidence of what was decided, not as a ruling that binds the Thai court. Thailand is also not a party to the Hague Convention of 2005 on Choice of Court Agreements or the Hague Convention of 2019 on the recognition of foreign judgments, so neither convention changes this for now.
Which route for which dispute
The table below sets out what each route needs, who decides it, how costs generally work, how enforceable the outcome is, and the kind of dispute it tends to suit. We leave out firm figures for cost and time where the law does not set them, because no two cases move at the same pace.
| Route | Consent needed? | Who decides | Cost | Enforceability | Typical disputes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Demand letter & negotiation | No to send a letter; yes to negotiate a deal | The parties themselves | Depends on the legal work involved | Only as a private contract, unless it becomes a court settlement | Any dispute, as a first step |
| Court-annexed mediation | Yes, from both sides | The parties, helped by a court-appointed mediator | No court fee for the mediation stage | Can become a consent judgment the court will enforce | Civil claims already filed, or about to be filed |
| Mediation under the 2019 Act | Yes, from both sides | The parties | Check with the mediation body you use | Settlement may be enforced through the courts if not honoured, subject to the applicable procedure and time limit | Categories set by the Dispute Mediation Act, including non-ownership land disputes and disputes between heirs; amounts and scope depend on the mediation body |
| Arbitration | Yes — only with an arbitration agreement | An arbitrator or panel appointed under the agreement and the applicable rules | Set by the arbitration institution and the arbitrators | A Thai court enforces awards under the Arbitration Act; foreign awards also fall under the New York Convention, subject to the statutory deadlines and grounds for refusal | Commercial contracts that already include an arbitration clause |
| Court | Not from the other side | A Thai judge | Depends on the claim amount and category, subject to applicable caps and exemptions | A Thai judgment is enforced in Thailand; enforcing it abroad depends on the rules of the country where the other side's assets are | Any civil claim without a valid arbitration agreement |
We recommend starting with your contract, not with the dispute itself: whether it contains an arbitration clause, what it says about the governing law, and where the other side's money or property actually is usually decides more about which route makes sense than the size of the claim does.
What to do next
Before choosing a route, gather the documents that will matter whatever you decide: the contract (including any annexes and amendments), the correspondence where the dispute first came up, and records of any payments made or missed. If the contract includes an arbitration clause, read it carefully — it may set a specific institution, a seat and a language, all of which affect cost and timing.
Send us the contract and the correspondence, and we will explain which routes are actually open to you, what documents are still missing, and roughly what to expect in cost before you commit to any one path. We typically reply within 24 hours, and we prepare documents in both English and Thai, or Russian and Thai. If you decide to go ahead, we can help on either side of the dispute: as a lawyer in Phuket for disputes, we prepare the demand letter, the mediation submission, the arbitration filing or the court claim, and keep you posted at each stage rather than leaving you to guess.
