Griffin’s Notice of Adjudication referred to previous invoices and letters only. Midas objected that the Adjudicator did not have jurisdiction as the Notice did not conform with the provisions of the Scheme. At enforcement, the Judge had to decide, with respect to s1(3) of the Scheme, whether the dispute referred had been described precisely.

The Judge held that although it is possible to give a Notice of Adjudication by reference to other correspondence, a party must ensure this correspondence is sufficiently clear and records the dispute with precision. He considered it crucial for the party receiving notice, and the adjudicator, to answer two key questions: “what is the brief description of the dispute and what the nature of the redress which is sought?”

In this case, only one dispute out of a series had been suitably defined in the Notice. Accordingly, the Adjudicator only had jurisdiction to deal with this dispute i.e. two outstanding invoices. He did not have jurisdiction to deal with all the invoices and general claims that were not identified in the Notice.