These Guidelines for Operation Processes of Remote Video Hearing (hereinafter referred to as these “Guidelines”) are developed by China Guangzhou Arbitration Commission (hereinafter referred to as the “Commission”), in order to standardize the practical operation of remote video hearing, according to relevant laws and regulations and the Arbitration Rules of China Guangzhou Arbitration Commission (hereinafter referred to as the Arbitration Rules). All participants in an arbitration in the form of video hearing shall refer to these Guidelines to carry out the video hearing.

Definition and Interpretation

Interpretation

These Guidelines serve as a supplement to these Guidelines for the Work of Case Manager in terms of video hearing and other procedures before the new version of the system is launched, as the integration of case management system, intelligent voice recognition system for hearing and video hearing platform of the Commission has not yet been completed.

Scope of Application

These Guidelines shall apply to the cases accepted by the Commission, Dongguan Sub-commission, Zhongshan Sub-commission, and Nansha International Arbitration Center and approved for remote video hearing under Article 53 of the Arbitration Rules. Matters uncovered in these Guidelines shall be governed by the Arbitration Rules.

Video Hearing

It refers to a remote video arbitration hearing conducted through the network platform provided by the Commission, upon approval by the Commission, because the arbitration participants are unable to appear in an offline hearing room of the Commission for reasons such as being in a different place. Other arbitration participants shall participate in the hearing in the offline hearing room of the Commission; multiple parties may participate in the remote Video Hearing at the same place; Neither arbitrators nor witnesses may participate in the remote Video Hearing in the same place other than the hearing room of the Commission as the parties; the case manager shall participate in the hearing in the hearing room of the Commission; the place of hearing and the place of making award shall be Guangzhou, China.

Video Hearing Participants

They refer to hearing participants including the case manager, arbitrators, parties (including their proxies), witnesses, expert witnesses, observers, and Video Hearing assistants. “Relevant Staff” as used herein refers to the case manager or Video Hearing assistants.

Video Hearing Platform and Recordings

The Commission will conduct remote Video Hearing through Xiaoyu Yilian (https://www.xylink.com/), which has certified encryption technology to ensure the security of data transmission. The video contents will be stored on the private cloud deployed by the Commission, and are deleted after being stored for a period of time. The whole process of the hearing and collegiate meeting will be recorded by means of audio and video recording, and the case manager will download and save the audio and video recordings into the case file.

Chapter I Acceptance of Application for Video Hearing and Preparations

I. Application for Video Hearing

1. An application for remote Video Hearing may be made by any of the parties, arbitrators or other arbitration participants. The application shall be made to the Commission in writing, and shall contain the reason for application, the promise to appear in hearing signed by the applicant, and the identity documents of the individuals appearing in the hearing. The individuals appearing in the hearing shall be the same as those named in the application, and changes to individuals appearing in the hearing are unacceptable during the hearing in principle.

Where the application is made by a party, the tribunal shall decide whether to approve it. Where the application is made by the tribunal, the Commission (the Division Head / President / Service Director in charge of the case) shall decide whether to approve it.

2. After the application for Video Hearing is approved, the case manager will communicate on and arrange for the specific matters concerning the hearing, including confirmation of appearance in the hearing, conditions (such as equipment, network and venue) for remote Video Hearing, time of hearing, arrangement of remote hearing equipment, and other matters. The case manager shall serve the arbitrators and the parties with documents such as a notice of Video Hearing, a tutorial on using Video Hearing Platform, and the Video Hearing disciplines.

At the same time, the case manager shall reserve an offline hearing room of the Commission, and non-Video Hearing Participants shall participate in the hearing in the hearing room of the Commission.

3. The case manager will ask the parties whether they would submit supplementary evidence and other materials, and require the parties to submit them as soon as possible and serve them upon the parties and the arbitrators according to the Arbitration Rules. In a case requiring remote Video Hearing, supplementary evidence may be served by mail in hard copy or soft copy and by email or other acceptable online transmission means in the form of electronic data.

II. Video Hearing Equipment Configuration and Environment

1. The arbitration participants shall preferably use the Commission’s remote hearing client for Video Hearing. For the specific method for using, please refer to the Quick Use Guide for Remote Hearing Equipment of Guangzhou Arbitration Commission.

2. The Video Hearing Participants shall choose a quiet, undisturbed, appropriately-lighted, network-unobstructed, and enclosed place to participate in the hearing.

3. The case manager shall remind the individuals appearing in the hearing to arrange the equipment and environment required for the Video Hearing, including but not limited to computers, cameras, speakers, headphones, microphones, power connections, Internet connections, and venues of hearing.

4. Under special circumstances, Relevant Staff may bring the equipment to the parties to assist them in the remote Video Hearing. Relevant Staff must receive the equipment as required, be responsible for keeping it, and return it promptly and intactly after use.

III. Pre-hearing Preparation

1. Preparations before the hearing

(1) Before the hearing (one day before the hearing and/or immediately before the hearing), Relevant Staff will test the Video Hearing environment for troubleshooting. If the test result is not satisfactory, the case manager will contact the technical staff of the Commission for a solution. If the Video Hearing cannot be held normally due to force majeure, the hearing will be postponed, in which case the tribunal will decide a new time for hearing; if the hearing is postponed for a party’s reasons, such party shall bear corresponding costs and liabilities.

(2) The case manager shall inform the parties or arbitrators that they should arrive at the venue of the hearing in advance for identity authentication and other preparations for the hearing.

(3) Relevant Staff shall check the venue of hearing to ensure that it is a quiet and closed space without other audio or video equipment, and that people other than individuals appearing in the hearing are prohibited from entering and leaving the space.

(4) Relevant Staff shall be familiar with the basic operation of the Video Hearing equipment to ensure the smooth progress of the hearing. If necessary, Relevant Staff shall ask the operation and maintenance technicians for help. For their contact information, see the column “technical support for operation and maintenance” on the left side in OA.

(5) It is required to ensure that the head and face of each party appearing in the hearing are completely displayed in a reasonable area of the video screen.

(6) It is required to ensure that the microphone may clearly record the speech of each party appearing in the hearing.

(7) The party appearing in Video Hearing shall ensure that no disclosure of the information related to the case is made to the outside in the hearing or at the venue of the hearing, and ensure stable power supply and unblocked network for the equipment used.

2. Pre-hearing procedures

(1) Relevant Staff will authenticate the identity of the parties: the identity authentication may be carried out through a desktop portable identity authentication machine; where a proxy appears in the hearing, its power of attorney, lawyer license and other documents shall be verified at the same time, and the verification results shall be recorded. If a party appear in the hearing without the presence of Relevant Staff, it is required to, in front of a camera, present his/her original ID card and other relevant identity documents, which will be verified jointly by the opposing party, the arbitrators and the case manager.

(2) If a party participates in the Video Hearing in a different place, Relevant Staff may inform him/her of his/her relevant rights and obligations and declare the hearing disciplines before the hearing, and keep relevant video and audio recordings for filing. The foregoing procedures that have been completed may be omitted in the formal hearing.

Chapter II Hearing Process

IV. Opening and Closing of Hearing

1. The opening of the hearing may be announced immediately after the presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator confirms with the case manager that all the pre-hearing preparations have been completed and that the case manager has started the video and audio recording.

2. The case manager will terminate the video and audio recording immediately after the presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator announces the closing of the hearing.

3. The collegial meeting of the tribunal shall be held after all parties have withdrawn from the hearing, and the presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator shall signal the start and end of the video and audio recording.

4. The case manager shall enter the video hearing room through the client on the recording computer, and share the records with all arbitration participants in real time.

V. Hearing disciplines

1. Where a party or another individual appearing in the hearing withdraws from the hearing due to objective circumstances such as technical or network failure occurring during the hearing, the presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator shall announce an adjournment of the hearing and give him/her a reasonable time for troubleshooting, and resume the hearing after the trouble is eliminated. If the trouble cannot be eliminated within a reasonable time, the hearing will be suspended and rescheduled.

2. Throughout the Video Hearing, it is required to keep the network unblocked. Except for reasons not attributable to a party concerned, such as network failure, equipment damage, power interruption or force majeure, if any party does not appear in the hearing on time, it will be deemed as refusal to appear in the hearing, and if such party withdraw without permission during the hearing, it will be deemed as withdrawal from an on-going hearing. If the Claimant refuses to appear in the hearing without justifiable reasons or withdraws from an on-going hearing without the permission of the tribunal, the Claimant may be deemed to have withdrawn its Request for Arbitration. If the Respondent has filed a counterclaim, the tribunal shall proceed with the hearing of the counterclaim and render a default award. If the Respondent refuses to appear in the hearing without justifiable reasons or withdraws from an on-going hearing without the permission of the tribunal, the tribunal shall proceed with the hearing. If the Respondent has filed a counterclaim, the Respondent may be deemed to have withdrawn its counterclaim.

3. The presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator has the authority to manage the hearing order, and may prohibit a specific arbitration participant from listening and speaking when necessary. The case manager has the operation authority to manage the hearing order; the presiding arbitrator or sole arbitrator will issue appropriate instructions to the case manager, and authorize the case manager to operate on the operation interface.

4. If a hearing participant encounters any technical failure during the hearing, he/she shall promptly report it to the tribunal or the case manager.

VI. Evidence Production and Cross-examination

1. For the evidence that has been exchanged before the hearing, the parties shall verify and issue cross-examination opinions on each other’s original evidence. If the opposing party is not in the same place, (authenticity and consistency) of its original evidence shall be verified by the arbitrators and Relevant Staff.

2. If the original of any evidence cannot be verified for geographical reasons or other objective reasons, the tribunal shall decide whether to verify it by other means based on the actual situation.

3. If a party produces supplementary evidence in the hearing and the tribunal admits it, the cross-examination and original verification shall be carried out in the hearing or after the hearing depending on the organization of the Video Hearing.

4. If the parties agree to issue cross-examination opinions on the evidence that has not been exchanged, the evidence producer is obliged to display the evidence on the video screen as required by the cross-examiner. For the evidence that is produced in the hearing but cannot be exchanged in the hearing, the tribunal may grant the parties a certain period of time to issue cross-examination opinions after the hearing.

VII. Appearance of Witnesses

1. Where a witness appears in the hearing via remote video, it shall be ensured that the witness does not participate in any hearing procedures other than making statements and being questioned.

2. The identity authentication method for the witnesses shall be the same as that for the parties.

Chapter III Other Procedures

VIII. Signing of Hearing Records

1. The case manager will display the hearing records during the hearing, allowing the parties to revise the contents of the hearing records, and ask the parties to orally confirm the contents of the hearing records after the hearing.

2. The arbitration participants in the hearing room of the Commission shall sign the hearing records after the hearing.

3. After the hearing, the case manager will mail the copies of the hearing records to the parties for signing. After the signing, the case manager shall indicate the method of signing in the hearing records. Multiple copies of the hearing records will be filed and stored at the same time.

IX. Collegial Meeting

1. Where the collegial meeting needs to be held via remote video, the video and audio recordings of the collegial meeting will be filed and stored.

2. The collegiate records may be signed in turn at the end of the meeting, and any arbitrator not signing the collegiate records then may otherwise sign it later.

X. Miscellaneous

1. The case manager shall, within 3 days after the end of the hearing, ask the administrator for relevant URL to download by himself/herself the hearing and collegiate video and audio recordings.

2. Relevant provisions of these Guidelines shall apply to other arbitration procedures such as cross-examination, appraisal meeting and mediation conducted via remote video.

3. Where any arbitration participant fails to arrive at the hearing room to participate in the hearing due to sudden events and thus applies for participation in the hearing via remote video, such participant shall give a written explanation to the case manager, and the matter shall be handled as follows:

(1) If an arbitrator fails to arrive at the hearing room, the application is subject to the consent of the parties appearing in the hearing and the approval of the Division Head / President / Service Director in charge of the case;

(2) In a party or another arbitration participant fails to arrive at the hearing room, the application is subject to the consent of the opposing party appearing in the hearing and the permission of the tribunal.