The suspension of procedural time limits during the court vacation period provided for by Law of 7 October 1969, No. 742, applies to the time limit for rendering the arbitral award pursuant to Article 820 of the Code of Civil Procedure, by reason of the jurisdictional nature of institutional arbitration as a means of dispute resolution alternative to judicial proceedings, as recognised by the case law subsequent to the reform introduced by Legislative Decree 40/2006.
The act by which a party intends to rely, pursuant to Article 821 of the Code of Civil Procedure, on the expiry of the time limit for rendering the award as a ground for nullity thereof, must be served on the opposing parties and on the arbitrators in accordance with the forms prescribed for service of civil procedural documents, on pain of ineffectiveness, it not being sufficient to transmit the same by certified electronic mail without the formalities proper to service.
For the purposes of the commencement of the time limit for relying on the forfeiture of the arbitrators pursuant to Article 821 of the Code of Civil Procedure, the relevant date is that of the deliberation of the award as appearing from the operative part signed by the majority of the arbitrators, and not the subsequent date of full signature or of communication of the award to the parties.
The failure to rule on an objection raised by a party in the arbitral proceedings does not give rise to the nullity of the award pursuant to Article 829, paragraph 1, No. 12, of the Code of Civil Procedure where such objection was formulated in relation to claims declared absorbed and has not assumed a decisive character for the purposes of the arbitral determination.
Pursuant to Article 829, paragraph 3, of the Code of Civil Procedure, as amended by Legislative Decree 40/2006, challenge of the award for violation of the rules of law relating to the merits of the dispute is admissible only if expressly provided for by the parties or by law, with the consequence that, in the absence of such provision in the arbitration agreement, the court hearing the challenge is precluded from any re-examination of questions of merits decided by the arbitrators.