More and more these days, family law issues are becoming a matter of divorce and child custody mediation. There are several reasons for this, mostly amounting to attorney availability, backlogs in the judicial system, increasing complexity in the legal system, affordability and privacy.

Why Courts Favor Child Custody and Divorce Mediation

Once upon a time, divorces and child custody issues were pretty cut and dry. Lawyers were able to offer their services at a discounted rate. Now the separation process, besides being emotionally complex times for the litigants, have become much more complex in the legal sense.

What used to be a matter of a few weeks can now be dragged out for years, once the case actually goes to trial. Getting there itself can take years thanks to a large backlog in the system. Child custody, in and of itself, is probably the most bitterly fought-out aspect of a separation, and if the divorce itself is not ordered to mediation, there is a good chance that child custody issues will go to mediation.

Why Lawyers Prefer Family Mediation

Along with the reasons that courts favor mediation, lawyers prefer mediation because it, unfortunately, requires an equal amount of work as a lawyer as any other case, but it calls on them more as counselor as well. That, along with fewer lawyers opting for family litigation, leads many others to either shun the whole business altogether or prefer to be family mediation attorneys. Why Clients Would Choose Civil Mediation Reasons why a family would choose to handle things in divorce and child custody mediation mostly match the court system's reasoning. It takes a long time to appear before a court, the process itself can be drawn out and expensive, and there are so many twists in the law now that it can be extremely confusing in an emotionally turbulent time. Additionally, with litigation, you do not have the assurance of privacy that you would with a mediated divorce.