Family Conflict Mediation  London UK

CAOS provides Family Conflict Mediation to support resolution of conflict between family members that has led to some form of relationship or communication breakdown because of challenges such as: 

• Parent - teenager relationship difficulties, sometimes leading to a risk of homelessness for the young person involved.
• Caring for a disabled, or ill relative including someone having end of life care, for example at home or in a hospice, and the challenges that these issues can cause for families wishing to organise care for the relative concerned. 
• Addiction - a member of the family may be in recovery from addiction and wanting to rebuild broken relationships that arose from the consequences of their addictive behaviour prior to entering into recovery.
• Following a family bereavement there can be difficult feelings about situations that arose prior to a relative passing away, perhaps in relation to funeral arrangements or attendance, care of the relative before dying, financial issues etc. and mediation can help with restoring broken or difficult relationships following this experience.
• Homelessness due to a family member leaving the home because of the severity of the relationship breakdown, or possibly because they have been 'kicked out' of the family home.
• Challenges for parents of children with Special Educational Needs in dealing with the added challenges that brings for the parenting relationship.  
• Other family conflict issues that can arise simply through the day-to-day challenges of connecting with other family members.

While predominantly London-based, CAOS Conflict Management has also trained Mediators who operate in areas across the UK so please still contact us if you are looking for support but not based in London. 

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CAOS  also offers Mediation Skills Training for organisations or individuals who work with families and wish to provide them with access to family conflict mediation to help them resolve intra-family conflicts such as those given above.

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How can Family Conflict Mediation help? 

Family Conflict Mediation provides an opportunity to 'step out' of a family relationship breakdown or conflict situation in order to have a conversation with the person or people with whom the conflict has arisen. 

The sole purpose of the mediation process is to help support the possibility of a better way forward in the situation. This is achieved by giving each person the opportunity to talk through the situation with the mediator separately, in what we call the Initial Mediation Meeting, about the difficulty from their perspective and to think about how it is affecting them and what they would want in order for things to improve.

This discussion by itself can often help people to start to create better ways forward because of the focus of the approach we use at CAOS Conflict Management where each interaction with the mediator allows for a discussion of ways of improving the situation.

We do things this way because mediation is a voluntary process and so it may be that one or even all of the people involved in the family conflict may not wish to go to the next stage of having a Joint Mediation Meeting with each other all together in the same room. 

By taking this approach it is often possible for improvement to occur even if there is not a Joint Meeting. Indeed sometimes it may only be one person who is wanting support in trying to improve the situation in which case they may, instead, request our Conflict Coaching service which is designed to be a 1-to-1 process for supporting individuals concerned about an unresolved conflict. 

If a Joint Mediation Meeting is requested by at least two of the family members involved in the situation then this is held in a place that is acceptable to all who participate. Usually this is in what is called a 'neutral' venue that has no particular significance to any person attending - so it could be somewhere like a meeting room in a church or community centre or a school, or even a hotel conference room. Each case will be different. 

The Joint Meeting will usually be up to 3 hours long and a second follow up meeting can also sometimes be requested if participants think it will be useful. But ultimately the purpose of mediation is to make itself unnecessary and so it will often be that once the participants have been able to sit with each other for a meeting of up to 3 hours and have a useful conversation, they can see that it is possible for them to do this by themselves in the future. If, however, they feel that a second mediation meeting would help this is provided at a cheaper rate than the first one. (See lower down for costs of this process.) 

Why does Family Conflict Mediation work? 

There are many reasons why using mediation to help resolve family conflict situations can be beneficial and some of these are given below: 

The Mediator is not someone the family knows, nor will they have an ongoing relationship with them beyond the mediation process. Mediation is a 'step-in-step-out' process that provides a temporary 'bubble' in which those involved can have a constructive, even if challenging, discussion. The Mediator is present to support that discussion in being effective and creative, not to give advice or to take over and 'assess, diagnose and prescribe' an answer to the situation.

Family Conflict Mediation is a process where the outcome created is down to the participants themselves, no-one else. It may lead to an 'agreement' of some kind but often the outcome has simply been that the people involved have gained a better understanding of each other's point of view and feel less upset by it, and they have also felt listened to by the other person(s) who attend. Whether via an agreement or simply better mutual understanding they then have ideas for better ways of doing things in their family relationship in the future. 

If a family situation is referred by an agency such as a family support worker or other social worker, or a GP they will understand that the Mediator will not be reporting back to them what is discussed or what the outcome is as the Mediator will remind them that they can ask the participants themselves for this information. In this way, participants' decisions about what they share about their meeting and what the outcomes are, are respected as being down to them and no one else. They may still decide to tell the referrer but the decision is theirs and no-one else's. 

In this way, Family Conflict Mediation supports the empowerment of the people involved to create their own way forward in the situation, something which can sometimes be lost sight of when a difficulty has involved a lot of other people, whether friends and other relatives or professional agencies. 

How much does Family Conflict Mediation cost and how can I get access to it?

Initial Mediation Meeting to discuss your situation - held with each person separately. 

£55-£85 sliding scale (unwaged) or £75-£195 (waged) for a session lasting 1-2 hours.

Fees for Joint Mediation Meeting  per person

Sliding scale of fees £70-£100 (unwaged) or £105-£220 (waged) per person, lasting 2-3 hours. 

This meeting is held at a safe, neutral venue with just the mediator and the other family member mediation participants. There will usually be additional fees for the venue. 

Any second Joint Mediation Meeting will be charged to each participant at 20% less than the fee paid for the first one. 

All payments to be made at least 2 days in advance of any meeting.

For referring agencies, the fees for the service will be as follows: 

Initial Mediation Meeting: £195 per person

Joint Mediation Meeting 1: £380 per meeting involving 2 participants. If meeting involves more than 2 participants there will be an additional charge of £100 per person.

Joint Mediation Meeting 2: £304 per meeting plus £80 per each additional participant.

For 'whole family' meetings involving 4 or more people, please contact us to discuss fees. 

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Please contact us on 020 3371 7507 in order to begin the mediation process or to discuss your interest in having Family Conflict Mediation or if you wish to refer a family you are working with for this service. 

Alternatively, please contact us on email via our Enquiry Form to find out more about our service. 

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