A challenge to an award for nullity under art. 829 cod. proc. civ. is a limited form of recourse, being allowed only for certain defects in procedendo and, as regards non-observance of rules of law, only where the parties have expressly provided for that possibility; the choice to allow a challenge to an award for error of law exclusively where that possibility has been expressly agreed does not infringe the principle of party autonomy and strengthens that of legal certainty.
The effects of a final criminal judgment under art. 652 cod. proc. pen. extend also to arbitration, at least where the arbitration is an arbitration according to law, the arbitral proceedings constituting proceedings in substitution for the ordinary courts which conclude with a decision to which the legal order attributes the effects of a judgment under art. 824 bis cod. proc. civ.
There is no failure to rule of the kind relevant under art. 829, co. 1, n. 12, cod. proc. civ. where the decision adopted by the arbitrators entails an implicit rejection of the objection raised by the party, such rejection being to be regarded as implicit where the question not expressly dealt with is incompatible with the logical and legal framework of the decision.
The indication in the award of the date of the arbitrators’ signatures is not prescribed by law on pain of nullity and its absence is not among the grounds of challenge, the requirement laid down by art. 823, co. 2, n. 8, cod. proc. civ. not being referred to by art. 829, co. 1, n. 5, cod. proc. civ.
Any irregularity in the communication of the award does not affect its validity, the award being already complete upon the last signature, and may at most be relevant as regards knowledge of the act or the running of time limits linked to its receipt, and not as an original defect capable of being relied upon in challenge proceedings under art. 829 cod. proc. civ.
A failure of reasoning in the award of the kind relevant under artt. 823 and 829 cod. proc. civ. arises exclusively where the reasoning is wholly lacking or displays so radical a deficiency as not to allow the ratio decidendi to be identified, thus amounting in substance to an absence of reasoning; the insufficiency, illogicality or alleged erroneousness of the arbitrators’ reasoning is not, however, reviewable, where that reasoning nevertheless allows the logical and legal course underlying the decision to be reconstructed.
A ground of challenge to an award which, while alleging breach of the provisions on the costs of the proceedings, in reality criticises the correctness of the arbitral decision outside the cases in which a challenge for breach of rules of law is permitted, is inadmissible.