Ninety Days and Six Grounds: What It Takes to Vacate a Minnesota Arbitration Award

An arbitration award arrives by email on a Thursday. The client reads it, is furious, and wants to know what can be done. Nine weeks later the client calls back, having thought about it, and says: let’s fight.

By then it is usually over.

Minnesota’s Revised Uniform Arbitration Act gives a losing party 90 days to move to vacate an award, and the clock starts when that party receives notice of the award — not when judgment is entered, not when the other side moves to confirm, and not when the client makes up their mind. Miss it and the district court does not weigh the equities. It confirms.

The second thing to understand is that the six grounds in Minn. Stat. § 572B.23(a) are a closed list, and not one of them is that the arbitrator got the law wrong. I have watched more than one sophisticated party spend real money briefing an argument that the award misapplied a statute, and that argument is not a ground. It is the thing the parties contracted away.

The six grounds, in the statute’s own words

Section 572B.23(a) does not say a court may vacate. It says:

(a) Upon motion of a party to the arbitration proceeding, the court shall vacate an award if:

(1) the award was procured by corruption, fraud, or other undue means;

(2) there was:

(A) evident partiality by an arbitrator appointed as a neutral;

(B) corruption by an arbitrator; or

(C) misconduct by an arbitrator prejudicing the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding;

(3) an arbitrator refused to postpone the hearing upon showing of sufficient cause for postponement, refused to consider evidence material to the controversy, or otherwise conducted the hearing contrary to section 572B.15, so as to prejudice substantially the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding;

(4) an arbitrator exceeded the arbitrator’s powers;

(5) there was no agreement to arbitrate, unless the person participated in the arbitration proceeding without raising the objection under section 572B.15, subsection (c), not later than the commencement of the arbitration hearing; or

(6) the arbitration was conducted without proper notice of the initiation of an arbitration as required in section 572B.09 so as to prejudice substantially the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding.

Read the list twice and notice what it is about: corruption, bias, procedural misconduct, an arbitrator acting outside the grant, and the absence of a contract or of notice. Every ground describes a defect in the process or in the authority. Not one describes a defect in the reasoning.

The Legislature also put § 572B.23 out of the parties’ reach. Section 572B.04(c) provides that the parties to an agreement to arbitrate may not waive or vary the requirements of § 572B.22, § 572B.23, § 572B.24, and § 572B.25(a) and (b), among others. A clause purporting to eliminate judicial review of an award is void as to these sections. A clause purporting to expand it gets you nothing either, because subsection (a) is a mandate to vacate on six enumerated findings, not an invitation to legislate a seventh.

Chapter 572B governs agreements to arbitrate entered into on or after August 1, 2011, and — under § 572B.03(b) — governs from that date forward “even if the arbitration agreement was entered into prior to August 1, 2011.” Older Minnesota decisions construe the predecessor act, Minn. Stat. ch. 572, whose vacatur provision was § 572.19, subd. 1. The Minnesota Supreme Court noted in Seagate Technology, LLC v. Western Digital Corp., 854 N.W.2d 750 (Minn. 2014), that §§ 572.09, 572.12, and 572.19 were repealed and replaced with §§ 572B.07, 572B.15, and 572B.23, “which contain substantially similar language.” Id. at 754 n.1. That is why the older cases still bite.

When does the ninety days actually start?

On receipt of notice of the award. Section 572B.23(b) sets three clocks in one sentence:

A motion under this section must be filed within 90 days after the movant receives notice of the award in a record pursuant to section 572B.19 or within 90 days after the movant receives notice of an arbitrator’s award in a record on a motion to modify or correct an award pursuant to section 572B.20, unless the motion is predicated upon the ground that the award was procured by corruption, fraud, or other undue means, in which case it must be filed within 90 days after such a ground is known or by the exercise of reasonable care should have been known by the movant.

Three triggers, and they are not interchangeable.

The default trigger is the arbitrator’s delivery of the award. Section 572B.19(a) requires the arbitrator to make a record of the award, requires the record to be authenticated by any arbitrator who concurs, and then provides that “[t]he arbitrator or the arbitration organization shall give notice of the award, including a copy of the award, to each party to the arbitration proceeding.” That transmittal is the event. Not the hearing, not the date typed on the award’s signature page, not the date the client forwards it to you.

The second trigger is a ruling on a motion to the arbitrator. Section 572B.20(b) lets a party move the arbitrator to modify or correct an award, but the motion “must be made and served on all parties within 20 days after the movant receives notice of the award,” and objections are due “within ten days after receipt of the notice.” § 572B.20(c). If you take that route, § 572B.23(b) gives you a fresh 90 days from notice of the arbitrator’s ruling on it. Section 572B.20(e) confirms the point from the other side: “[a]n award modified or corrected pursuant to this section is subject to sections 572B.22, 572B.23, and 572B.24.”

The third trigger is a discovery rule, and it applies to exactly one ground. Corruption, fraud, or other undue means — § 572B.23(a)(1) — runs 90 days from when the ground is known or reasonably should have been known. That is the only ground with a discovery rule. Evident partiality has none. An arbitrator’s undisclosed relationship discovered in month five is not automatically salvaged by subsection (b), and I would not build a strategy on the assumption that a nondisclosure is “undue means” within the meaning of clause (1) simply because it was concealed.

The 90-day figure repeats in the modification statute. Section 572B.24(a) opens with the identical formula — “[u]pon motion filed within 90 days after the movant receives notice of the award in a record pursuant to section 572B.19 or within 90 days after the movant receives notice of an arbitrator’s award in a record on a motion to modify or correct an award pursuant to section 572B.20.” So the vacatur motion and the modification motion share a window, and § 572B.24(c) says the two “may be joined.”

The practical instruction is unglamorous. I calendar 90 days from the date the arbitrator’s transmittal hits the inbox, and I calendar a separate 20-day date for the § 572B.20 motion to the arbitrator, on the day the award arrives — before anyone has decided whether to challenge it. The decision takes longer than twenty days more often than clients expect.

Miss the ninety days and you do not get to argue the merits at all

This is the part clients find hardest to believe. The deadline is not a soft filing preference that a good reason can excuse. Minnesota has enforced it as an absolute bar for more than fifty years.

In Component Systems, Inc. v. Murray Enterprises of Minnesota, Inc., 300 Minn. 21 (1974), the losing party did not move to vacate; it waited, and when the winner moved to confirm eight months later, it raised its vacatur grounds in an answer to the confirmation motion. The supreme court held that the trial court “was obliged to confirm the award.” Id. at 25. On the attempt to smuggle the grounds in defensively, the court was blunt:

Appellant asserts that the 90-day period does not deprive a party of the right to a hearing on a motion to vacate an award when the motion to vacate is contained in an answer filed in a proceeding to confirm the award. In the face of the unambiguous language of the Uniform Arbitration Act, we cannot accept appellant’s assertion.

Id. One of the grounds urged in Component Systems was that the arbitrator had once been attorney for both parties. The court observed that the relationship was known to both sides when they agreed to him, that the absence of a hearing “was well known to appellant at the time it received the award,” and that “no application to vacate on that ground was made within the 90-day statutory period.” Id. Real facts, real grounds, no relief.

Five years later the supreme court described its own practice in Crosby-Ironton Federation of Teachers, Local 1325 v. Independent School District No. 182, 285 N.W.2d 667 (Minn. 1979): “Under a different section of the Uniform Arbitration Act, section 572.19, this court has strictly enforced the 90-day time limit for applications to vacate an award. In three recent cases, the court has confirmed awards where the parties did not apply for vacation within 90 days.” Id. at 670. The same opinion states the governing premise for every deadline in the chapter: “It is well settled that statutory arbitration must comply with the requirements of the governing statute.” Id. at 669.

The court of appeals has put the characterization plainly. In All Metro Supply, Inc. v. Warner, 707 N.W.2d 1 (Minn. App. 2005), construing the predecessor act, the court held that “[b]ecause the time limits in the arbitration statute are jurisdictional, the district court lacked authority” to act after the statutory window closed, id. at 5, and that the shorter limit governing the arbitrator route “is strictly construed,” id. at 4.

Three statutory provisions do the rest of the work. Section 572B.22 provides that after a party receives notice of an award, that party may move to confirm, “at which time the court shall issue such an order unless the award is modified or corrected pursuant to section 572B.20 or 572B.24 or is vacated pursuant to section 572B.23.” Section 572B.23(d) adds that “[i]f a motion to vacate an award is denied and a motion to modify or correct the award is not pending, the court shall confirm the award.” And § 572B.25(a) requires the court to enter judgment on an order confirming — a judgment that “may be recorded, docketed, and enforced as any other judgment in a civil action.”

Two mechanical traps sit inside the same window, and both have cost people their motions.

First, service. Section 572B.05(a) requires an application for judicial relief to be “made by motion to the court and heard in the manner and upon the notice provided by law or rule of court for making and hearing motions.” Then subsection (b): “Notice of an initial motion to the court under sections 572B.01 to 572B.31 must be served in the manner provided by law for the service of a summons in a civil action unless a civil action is already pending involving the agreement to arbitrate.” Where the arbitration was freestanding — no lawsuit ever filed — your motion to vacate is an initial motion, and it must be served like a summons. Personal service, not email to opposing counsel.

Second, venue. Section 572B.27 sends the motion to “the court of the county in which the agreement to arbitrate specifies the arbitration hearing is to be held or, if the hearing has been held, in the court of the county in which it was held,” and only failing that to a county where an adverse party resides or has a place of business. All subsequent motions go to the court that heard the first one. Section 572B.26(b) makes the point structural: an agreement providing for arbitration in Minnesota “confers exclusive jurisdiction on the court to enter judgment on an award under sections 572B.01 to 572B.31.”

What does “evident partiality” require, and what must an arbitrator disclose?

Section 572B.12 is the most useful provision in the chapter and the least used. It converted a case-law standard into a disclosure regime with a presumption attached, and it is the only place in chapter 572B where the drafters gave a party a structural advantage.

The duty comes first. Before accepting appointment, an arbitrator, “after making a reasonable inquiry,” must disclose to all parties and to any other arbitrators

any known facts that a reasonable person would consider likely to affect the impartiality of the arbitrator in the arbitration proceeding, including:

(1) a financial or personal interest in the outcome of the arbitration proceeding; and

(2) an existing or past relationship with any of the parties to the agreement to arbitrate or the arbitration proceeding, their counsel or representatives, witnesses, or the other arbitrators.

§ 572B.12(a). Subsection (b) makes the obligation continuing for facts learned after appointment.

Then the machinery. If the arbitrator does disclose and a party timely objects, the objection “may be a ground to vacate the award under section 572B.23, subsection (a)(2).” § 572B.12(c). If the arbitrator does not disclose, then “upon timely objection of a party, an award may be vacated under section 572B.23, subsection (a)(2).” § 572B.12(d). Both routes are permissive — may — and both require a timely objection.

Subsection (e) is the one to memorize:

An arbitrator appointed as a neutral who does not disclose a known, direct, and material interest in the outcome of the arbitration proceeding or a known, existing, and substantial relationship with a party is presumed to act with evident partiality under section 572B.23, subsection (a)(2).

That is a presumption, not a factor. Where the nondisclosure fits the description, the challenging party is not proving bias; the other side is rebutting a presumption of it.

And subsection (f) is the trap that swallows the whole thing:

If the parties to an arbitration proceeding agree to the procedures of an arbitration organization or any other procedures for challenges to arbitrators before an award is made, substantial compliance with those procedures is a condition precedent to a motion to vacate an award on that ground under section 572B.23, subsection (a)(2).

Nearly every commercial and consumer clause I read incorporates a provider’s rules, and every major provider’s rules contain an arbitrator-challenge procedure. So in the ordinary case the disclosure ground is forfeited unless someone raised the objection with the provider before the award issued. A party who sits on a suspicious disclosure, loses, and then discovers § 572B.12 has already lost the ground.

The case law behind the standard is short and it is generous where it applies. In Northwest Mechanical, Inc. v. Public Utilities Commission of the City of Virginia, 283 N.W.2d 522 (Minn. 1979), the supreme court reversed a district court that had confirmed an award, on facts the court itself described as unremarkable: one arbitrator was an officer or director of companies that had done substantial construction work for the city, and another had represented the city in at least four cases in the preceding decade. Id. at 523. The court was candid that “these relationships are neither uninterrupted nor of a magnitude making bias inevitable” and that “one could hardly expect any less interrelationship in a city the size of Virginia.” It added: “Nor is there any claim of fraud or attempted concealment or any challenge to the merits of the award.” Id. It reversed anyway, on two findings: the contacts “are ‘dealings that might create an impression of possible bias’” and “[t]hese contacts were not disclosed to the parties as required by Commonwealth Coatings.” Id. at 524.

Two things about that case matter. The nondisclosure did the work, not the relationship. And the court applied the federal arbitration statute, because construction materials came from around the country — which tells you how often the FAA is the operative law even in a dispute between two Minnesota entities.

The supreme court has also foreclosed the alternative remedy. In L & H Airco, Inc. v. Rapistan Corp., 446 N.W.2d 372 (Minn. 1989), holding arbitrators immune from suit, the court wrote: “Our decision does not leave aggrieved parties remediless, however,” and, quoting the predecessor vacatur statute, “[w]e believe the proper remedy lies therein rather than in a civil suit against the arbitrator.” Id. at 377. If an arbitrator hid something, the motion under § 572B.23(a)(2) is the whole of your relief.

Does manifest disregard of the law survive as a ground in Minnesota?

No. I will state my position and then show the work, because this is genuinely contested in the commentary and it should not be.

Manifest disregard of the law is not an independent ground for vacating an award in Minnesota, and it never has been. No Minnesota appellate decision has adopted it. One decision squarely presented the question, framed it as an issue, and declined to apply it. Every other Minnesota use of the phrase attaches to the agreement, not to the law — a different doctrine that people keep confusing with this one. And on the federal side, which governs a large share of Minnesota arbitrations, the Eighth Circuit has held the FAA’s enumerated grounds exclusive and the argument not cognizable.

Start with the text. Section 572B.23(a) says the court “shall vacate an award if” one of six things is true. It is a mandate keyed to findings, not a floor. And the Legislature made the section nonwaivable under § 572B.04(c) — you cannot contract around it in either direction. A statute drafted that way does not leave room for a judicially added seventh ground.

Then the one case that asked. In re the Arbitration between Hunter, Keith Industries, Inc. v. Piper Capital Management Inc., 575 N.W.2d 850 (Minn. App. 1998), listed among its issues: “Is manifest disregard of the law a basis for overturning an arbitration award in Minnesota?” Id. at 852. The party urging the doctrine was Piper, which had lost a $1,000,000 punitive damages award in a NASD arbitration and argued the panel had disregarded ERISA’s preemptive scope. Its hook for importing the federal doctrine was that its opponent, Hunter, Keith, had moved to confirm that award under the Federal Arbitration Act as well as the Minnesota act. The court’s answer:

Piper contends this court should apply the doctrine of manifest disregard for the law because Hunter, Keith moved to confirm the punitive damages award under the Federal Arbitration Act as well as the Minnesota Act. We disagree.

Id. at 855. Its stated reason was that “the Eighth Circuit has not used manifest disregard of the law as a basis for overturning arbitration awards.” Id. The court then held the record insufficient on the merits anyway, expressly separating the two questions — “[s]eparate from the question of whether Minnesota should recognize the manifest disregard doctrine is whether Piper has in this action demonstrated that the arbitration panel intentionally disregarded the law,” id. at 856 — and closing with the distinction that decides most of these fights: “An arbitration panel that incorrectly interpreted the law has not manifestly disregarded it; it has simply made a legal mistake.” Id. at 857.

Twenty-eight years have passed since Hunter, Keith was decided in March 1998, and no Minnesota appellate decision has taken the invitation. The court of appeals said so itself in 2013, in the decision the supreme court went on to affirm in Seagate: “The Minnesota Supreme Court has not expressly adopted or even addressed the manifest-disregard doctrine, and this court has not embraced it.” Seagate Tech., LLC v. W. Digital Corp., 834 N.W.2d 555, 565 n.8 (Minn. App. 2013), aff’d, 854 N.W.2d 750 (Minn. 2014). The same footnote adds the federal half of the answer, citing Medicine Shoppe for the proposition that manifest disregard “may no longer be available as a basis separate from those bases articulated in the FAA.”

Then the rule the supreme court actually applies, which is the opposite. The governing statement is Cournoyer v. American Television & Radio Co., 249 Minn. 577 (1957):

[A]n arbitrator, in the absence of any agreement limiting his authority, is the final judge of both law and fact, including the interpretation of the terms of any contract, and his award will not be reviewed or set aside for mistake of either law or fact in the absence of fraud, mistake in applying his own theory, misconduct, or other disregard of duty.

Id. at 580. Cournoyer adds that “[a]n award will not be set aside merely because the court thinks the arbitrators erred either as to the law or the facts.” Id. The supreme court quoted that “final judge of both law and fact” language in State, Office of the State Auditor v. Minnesota Association of Professional Employees, 504 N.W.2d 751, 754 (Minn. 1993), where it summarized the consequence: “Thus, the scope of judicial review of an arbitration award is extremely narrow.” Id. at 755. It quoted Cournoyer again in 2023. A rule that the arbitrator is the final judge of the law cannot coexist with a ground for vacatur premised on the arbitrator getting the law wrong, however egregiously.

Seagate says the same thing from a different angle, quoting a 1976 decision: “Where the arbitrators are not restricted by the submission to decide according to principles of law, they may make an award according to their own notion of justice without regard to the law.” 854 N.W.2d at 764. And in the same passage: “an award will not be vacated merely because the court may believe the arbitrators erred.” Id.

Now the confusion, which is worth naming. Minnesota opinions do use the words “manifest disregard” — attached to the contract. The essence test for a labor award asks, among other things, whether the award “evince[] a manifest disregard” of the collective bargaining agreement — the court’s own bracketing. That phrase, from Ramsey County v. AFSCME, Council 91, Local 8, 309 N.W.2d 785, 792 (Minn. 1981), was quoted by the supreme court in Hennepin Healthcare System, Inc. v. AFSCME Minnesota Council 5, No. A21-1079 (Minn. May 17, 2023), at 8. Disregarding the agreement goes to whether the arbitrator exceeded the grant under § 572B.23(a)(4). Disregarding the law goes to nothing. Anyone citing a Minnesota case with “manifest disregard” in it should check which noun follows.

The federal answer, because it will be the answer in most commercial cases. In Hall Street Associates, L.L.C. v. Mattel, Inc., 552 U.S. 576 (2008), the Supreme Court held that “the text compels a reading of the §§10 and 11 categories as exclusive.” Id. at 586. The Eighth Circuit applied that to this exact argument in Medicine Shoppe International, Inc. v. Turner Investments, Inc., 614 F.3d 485 (8th Cir. 2010): “We have previously recognized the holding in Hall Street and similarly hold now that an arbitral award may be vacated only for the reasons enumerated in the FAA,” and, of claims including the claim “that the arbitrator disregarded the law,” that they “are not included among those specifically enumerated in § 10 and are therefore not cognizable.” Id. at 489.

The counter-authority, stated fairly. Hall Street left a door open, and the door is expressly a state-law door:

In holding that §§10 and 11 provide exclusive regimes for the review provided by the statute, we do not purport to say that they exclude more searching review based on authority outside the statute as well. The FAA is not the only way into court for parties wanting review of arbitration awards: they may contemplate enforcement under state statutory or common law, for example, where judicial review of different scope is arguable.

552 U.S. at 590. So the question genuinely returns to Minnesota law. But Minnesota’s answer is the one above: a six-item mandate the parties cannot vary, a supreme court rule that the arbitrator is the final judge of the law, and a court of appeals decision that was handed the doctrine and declined it. The door Hall Street left open leads to a room Minnesota never furnished.

A related ground deserves the same treatment. Minnesota has not formally adopted the public-policy exception either. In State Auditor the supreme court took up “whether to recognize a public policy exception in Minnesota,” 504 N.W.2d at 752, worked through W.R. Grace and Misco, and then declined to vacate a reinstatement award it plainly disliked. Hunter, Keith read the record the same way in 1998: “Minnesota courts have not formally adopted the public policy exception.” 575 N.W.2d at 857. If you are relying on public policy to undo an award, you are relying on a proposition Minnesota has repeatedly discussed and never yet used to vacate anything.

Do you have to object during the arbitration to preserve a ground?

For one ground, yes. For the other five, no — and the supreme court rejected a contrary rule it had been urged to import.

Seagate arose from an award exceeding $500 million after the arbitrator imposed evidentiary sanctions for fabricated evidence. The district court vacated in part; the court of appeals reinstated the award on a waiver theory borrowed from the Eighth Circuit, which finds waiver whenever a party failed to object during the arbitration and had itself invoked a similar power. The supreme court affirmed the reinstatement but threw out that reasoning, and it did so on the statute’s face:

Based on this analysis, we conclude that under Minn.Stat. § 572.19, subd. 1, an objection during arbitration is required only for challenges brought under subdivision 1(5) and is not required for challenges brought under the other clauses of that subdivision.

854 N.W.2d at 759. The reasoning transfers cleanly to chapter 572B, because the objection requirement now sits inside the text of § 572B.23(a)(5) itself and nowhere else: no agreement to arbitrate, “unless the person participated in the arbitration proceeding without raising the objection under section 572B.15, subsection (c), not later than the commencement of the arbitration hearing.” A condition expressly stated in one clause and omitted from five is a drafting choice, and the court treated it as one. It also declined to graft an objection requirement on for practical reasons — “[g]iven the very limited appeal rights, the absence of a transcript in many informal arbitration proceedings, and the use of nonlawyers as arbitrators in some arbitration hearings, the imposition of an objection requirement by our court when the Legislature did not do so would be an awkward fit at best.” Id. at 759.

Do not read that as permission to stay quiet. Section 572B.12(f) imposes its own condition precedent on the partiality ground, and § 572B.09(b) waives notice objections by appearance. What Seagate removes is a general, judge-made preservation rule — not the specific ones the statute writes.

Seagate also narrowed the most commonly pleaded procedural ground. Section 572B.23(a)(3) covers a refusal to postpone, a refusal “to consider evidence material to the controversy,” and conduct of the hearing contrary to § 572B.15. Parties routinely read that middle phrase as reaching an arbitrator who received evidence and then gave it no weight. It does not:

Based on an analysis of the statutory language, we conclude that it is appropriate to read Minn.Stat. § 572.19, subd. 1(4), as a provision concerned with the admissibility of evidence and the manner in which the hearing is conducted, not as a provision limiting the arbitrator’s authority to use, or refuse to use, certain evidence when providing relief or fashioning an award after the hearing has been completed.

Id. at 766–67. The evidence in Seagate was received; the arbitrator simply declined to factor it into the award because of the sanctions. That challenge, the court held, was “outside the scope” of the provision. Id. If your complaint is about weighing rather than admitting, clause (3) is not your clause.

“Exceeded the arbitrator’s powers” is a contract question, not a merits question

Clause (4) is where most serious challenges live, and it is narrower than its words suggest. The scope of an arbitrator’s authority is reviewed de novo, but the inquiry is confined to the grant. Seagate frames it through Children’s Hospital: an award “will be set aside by the courts only when the objecting party meets its burden of proof that the arbitrators have clearly exceeded the powers granted to them in the arbitration agreement; courts will not overturn an award merely because they may disagree with the arbitrators’ decision on the merits.” 854 N.W.2d at 760–61. And the presumption runs the wrong way for a challenger: “[e]very reasonable presumption is exercised in favor of the finality and validity of the award.” Id.

The limit is real, though. “[T]he arbitrator cannot expand his authority beyond what could reasonably be interpreted from the arbitration agreement.” Id. at 762. So the honest version of clause (4) is: read the clause, find the words that did not authorize what the arbitrator did, and argue from those words. An argument that starts with how wrong the outcome was is an argument about the merits wearing a clause (4) costume.

The Minnesota Supreme Court’s most recent word on clause (4) confirms how little room there is. In Hennepin Healthcare, decided May 17, 2023, the court reversed a court of appeals decision that had vacated an award under § 572B.23(a)(4). It began from the premise that “[t]he Minnesota Uniform Arbitration Act provides limited grounds upon which a court may vacate an arbitration award,” slip op. at 6, and it described the essence test as “not a means for parties to call upon courts to carefully review the merits of an arbitrator’s interpretation” but rather a check “that the arbitrator did in fact rationally base their award on the parties’ agreement — a standard that does not set a particularly high bar.” Id. at 13. The court held the appellate panel “erroneously substituted its own judgment for that of the arbitrator.” Id. at 2.

Modification and correction are a different motion aimed at a different defect

Vacatur attacks the award. Modification fixes it. Section 572B.24(a) shares the 90-day window and lists three grounds, all of them about form:

(1) there was an evident mathematical miscalculation or an evident mistake in the description of a person, thing, or property referred to in the award;

(2) the arbitrator has made an award on a claim not submitted to the arbitrator and the award may be corrected without affecting the merits of the decision upon the claims submitted; or

(3) the award is imperfect in a matter of form not affecting the merits of the decision on the claims submitted.

Notice the verb in each: miscalculation, mistake in description, claim not submitted, imperfect in form. Nothing about reasoning. And notice the consequence written into subsection (b): if the motion is granted, “the court shall modify or correct and confirm the award as modified or corrected.” Otherwise — “the court shall confirm the award.” A modification motion is a confirmation motion with a request attached. Filing one without also moving to vacate is a decision to accept the award.

There are two forums for the same complaint, and they are not the same motion. Section 572B.20(a) lets a party ask the arbitrator to modify or correct on the § 572B.24(a)(1) and (3) grounds, or “because the arbitrator has not made a final and definite award upon a claim submitted by the parties to the arbitration proceeding,” or “to clarify the award.” Clarification appears nowhere in § 572B.24, so a motion to the arbitrator is the only way a party can ask for one, and it closes in 20 days. § 572B.20(b). The court has a parallel power under § 572B.20(d), but only “[i]f a motion to the court is pending under sections 572B.22, 572B.23, and 572B.24” — so the court cannot send an award back for clarification unless a timely motion is already in front of it.

After vacatur, who hears it again?

Section 572B.23(c) answers this with a precision most practitioners miss, and the answer depends on which ground you won:

In vacating an award on a ground other than that set forth in subsection (a)(5), the court may order a rehearing before a new arbitrator. If the award is vacated on the ground stated in subsection (a)(3), (4), or (6), the court may order a rehearing before the arbitrator who made the award or the arbitrator’s successor. The arbitrator must render the decision in the rehearing within the same time as that provided in section 572B.19, subsection (b), for an award.

Three rules in three sentences. Win on corruption, fraud, or undue means under (a)(1), or on partiality, corruption, or misconduct under (a)(2), and the rehearing goes to a new arbitrator — the original is disqualified by the nature of the finding. Win on a procedural defect, an excess of authority, or bad notice under (a)(3), (4), or (6), and the court has the additional option of sending it back to the same arbitrator, which is often exactly what a party who won on a technicality does not want. And win under (a)(5) — no agreement to arbitrate — and there is no rehearing at all, because there was never anything to arbitrate. The claim goes to court.

That structure has a consequence worth thinking through before you file. A client who wants out of arbitration entirely has one ground that gets them out: (a)(5). Every other ground, at best, buys a second arbitration.

Confirmation, judgment, and who pays for the fight

Confirmation is the default and it is nearly automatic. Section 572B.22 directs that on a motion to confirm “the court shall issue such an order” unless the award has been modified, corrected, or vacated. Section 572B.23(d) requires confirmation when a vacatur motion is denied and no modification motion is pending. Section 572B.24(b) requires confirmation when a modification motion fails. There is no fourth outcome.

On judgment, § 572B.25(a) provides that “[u]pon granting an order confirming, vacating without directing a rehearing, modifying, or correcting an award, the court shall enter a judgment in conformity therewith,” and that judgment “may be recorded, docketed, and enforced as any other judgment in a civil action.” Read the list of triggers: a vacatur with a rehearing produces no judgment, because the matter is not over.

Fees are the provision people forget. Section 572B.25(b) allows “reasonable costs of the motion and subsequent judicial proceedings.” Subsection (c) goes further:

On application of a prevailing party to a contested judicial proceeding under section 572B.22, 572B.23, or 572B.24, the court may add to a judgment confirming, vacating without directing a rehearing, modifying, or correcting an award, attorney fees and other reasonable expenses of litigation incurred in a judicial proceeding after the award is made.

That cuts both ways, and it is the number I put in front of a client who wants to challenge a weak award on principle. The party that moves to confirm and beats a losing challenge can ask for its fees for the confirmation fight. Section 572B.25(c) is not on the nonwaivable lists in § 572B.04 — only subsections (a) and (b) are protected — so read the clause, too.

Which orders can be appealed — and the one that cannot

Section 572B.28(a) enumerates six appealable orders:

(1) an order denying a motion to compel arbitration;

(2) an order granting a motion to stay arbitration;

(3) an order confirming or denying confirmation of an award;

(4) an order modifying or correcting an award;

(5) an order vacating an award without directing a rehearing; or

(6) a final judgment entered pursuant to sections 572B.01 to 572B.31.

The trap is clause (5). An order vacating an award and directing a rehearing is not on that list. The party who just lost a $2 million award and is being sent back to a new arbitrator has no appeal of right from that order — it must live through the second arbitration and appeal from whatever judgment eventually issues, or seek discretionary review. The party who wins a clean vacatur with no rehearing hands its opponent an immediate appeal.

Then the timing, where a widely repeated error persists. Section 572B.28(b) provides that “[a]n appeal under this section must be taken as from an order or a judgment in a civil action.” Under the current Rule 104.01, subd. 1, of the Minnesota Rules of Civil Appellate Procedure, “[u]nless a different time is provided by statute, an appeal may be taken from a judgment within 60 days after its entry, and from an appealable order within 60 days after service by any party of written notice of its filing.” Chapter 572B provides no different time. So it is 60 days, on the ordinary civil track.

Where does the error come from? In 1995 the court of appeals held that district court proceedings under the arbitration act were “special proceedings” under Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 103.03(g), and dismissed an appeal for missing a 30-day window on that theory. The supreme court reversed within seven weeks, in Pulju v. Metropolitan Property & Casualty, 535 N.W.2d 608 (Minn. 1995), reinstating the appeal and saying so plainly:

Without decisional or statutory authority and for reasons not clear from its decision, the court of appeals has undertaken to wholly reshape long-accepted methods of appeal by declaring that arbitration proceedings are “special proceedings” within the meaning of Minn.R.Civ.App.P. 103.03(g).

Id. at 608–09. The advisory committee comment to Rule 103.03 records the point, noting that arbitration proceedings “are not ‘special’ proceedings under Rule 103.03” and citing Pulju. Anyone who reads the court of appeals decision at 532 N.W.2d 592 without checking what happened next will calendar the wrong number.

When chapter 572B is not the statute that governs you

Three situations take an award out of this machinery, and each has its own article.

The Federal Arbitration Act. Where the FAA applies — and under a commerce-clause-width reading it usually does — the vacatur grounds are 9 U.S.C. § 10 and, after Hall Street, they are exclusive. The Minnesota grounds track them closely enough that a party rarely has to choose, but the choice of statute drives the forum, the appeal route, and whether Medicine Shoppe forecloses your argument outright. I have written separately on how much of Minnesota’s arbitration policy survives the FAA and on how a 1925 merchants’ statute became a consumer regime.

No-fault automobile arbitration. Section 572B.29(b) is unusual and nonwaivable: “When provisions of sections 572B.01 to 572B.31 are in conflict with provisions of sections 65B.41 to 65B.71, the provisions of sections 65B.41 to 65B.71 shall prevail.” No-fault arbitration runs on its own track, with its own rules and its own review, and the arbitrator’s legal determinations are treated differently there than in a commercial case.

Arbitration you never agreed to. Chapter 572B reaches agreements to arbitrate contained in a record — nothing else. In Minnesota Department of Corrections v. Knutson, No. A21-0300 (Minn. June 29, 2022), a discharged manager who obtained a favorable arbitrator’s decision under a statutory grievance procedure argued that review belonged in district court under chapter 572B. The supreme court disagreed. It held that “Knutson and the Department did not agree to arbitrate so the Uniform Arbitration Act does not apply,” and that the section 43A.33 decision “is reviewable by certiorari because it is a final, quasi-judicial disposition of the rights of Knutson and the Department that is not otherwise reviewable.” Slip op. at 3. The reason is textual: “the plain language of the Uniform Arbitration Act shows that it only applies to agreements to arbitrate contained in a record, i.e., agreements that are written or similarly stored in electronic form.” Id. at 7. If the arbitration came from a statute rather than a contract, filing a § 572B.23 motion is filing in the wrong court under the wrong statute — and the certiorari deadline will be running while you do it.

Court-annexed ADR under General Rule of Practice 114 is a fourth thing entirely; that program has its own award and review structure. And if the question is what a pre-dispute clause could take away from you in the first place, that is the § 572B.04 analysis, which is where the nonwaivable core of judicial review is laid out.

The six grounds, and what each one actually costs you to prove

How often does this work? Rarely, and I say so before I take the engagement

I want to emphasize the arithmetic of what a challenger is being asked to do. The statute supplies six findings, none of them about the outcome. The standard of review is, in the supreme court’s own words, “extremely narrow.” State Auditor, 504 N.W.2d at 755. Every reasonable presumption runs in favor of the award. The arbitrator is the final judge of the law. And on the two grounds where a challenger has the best structural tools — partiality and no-agreement — the statute imposes preservation requirements that most parties have already blown by the time they call a lawyer.

The pattern in the reported decisions tells the same story. In Seagate a district court vacated part of a half-billion-dollar award and was reversed; the award was reinstated in full. In Hennepin Healthcare the court of appeals vacated an award and the supreme court reversed that too, holding the panel had substituted its judgment for the arbitrator’s. The clearest Minnesota vacatur I can point to is Northwest Mechanical, and it turned not on a bad result but on a nondisclosure, in an opinion that went out of its way to say the relationships were not of a magnitude making bias inevitable and the merits were not challenged.

That is the shape of the thing. Awards fall because of what happened around the decision — who the arbitrator was, what was hidden, whether there was a contract, whether the hearing was a hearing. They do not fall because the decision was wrong.

What I do the day an award arrives

1. Calendar two dates immediately. Ninety days from receipt of notice of the award for a motion under § 572B.23 or § 572B.24, and twenty days for a motion to the arbitrator under § 572B.20. Both run from receipt of notice, not from the date on the award.
2. Pull the disclosures. Every disclosure the arbitrator made, the provider’s disclosure and challenge rules, and any objection anyone made. Section 572B.12 is where the leverage is, and § 572B.12(f) is where it disappears.
3. Ask what the clause said, not what the award said. Clause (4) is a contract argument. If I cannot quote the words of the agreement that the arbitrator went past, I do not have a clause (4) motion.
4. Separate admission from weight. If the complaint is that material evidence was refused at the hearing, that is § 572B.23(a)(3). If it is that the arbitrator ignored evidence he received, Seagate says it is not.
5. Decide the forum question first. FAA or chapter 572B; contract arbitration or statutory arbitration under Knutson; commercial or no-fault under § 572B.29(b). The wrong statute is a wasted 90 days.
6. Serve it like a summons. Section 572B.05(b), unless a civil action involving the agreement is already pending. And file it in the county § 572B.27 designates.
7. Price the downside honestly. Section 572B.25(c) lets the winner of the confirmation fight ask for its post-award attorney fees. A challenge that has no ground has a cost.

At Madgett Law, LLC I handle the back end of arbitration — motions to vacate, modify, correct, and confirm awards under chapter 572B and the Federal Arbitration Act, the disclosure and partiality fight under § 572B.12, and appeals from the orders § 572B.28 makes appealable. If an award has issued against you, the first question is what day it arrived. Send us a message or call 612-470-6529.

Sources: Minn. Stat. § 572B.03 (when act applies — subsections (a) and (b)); § 572B.04 (effect of agreement to arbitrate; nonwaivable provisions — subsection (c), which protects §§ 572B.22, 572B.23, 572B.24, and 572B.25, subsections (a) and (b)); § 572B.05 (application to court — subsection (a), motion practice; subsection (b), service of an initial motion in the manner provided for a summons); § 572B.09 (initiation of arbitration — subsection (a) notice; subsection (b) waiver by appearance); § 572B.12 (disclosure by arbitrator — subsection (a) duty and its two enumerated categories, subsection (b) continuing duty, subsections (c) and (d) timely objection, subsection (e) presumption of evident partiality, subsection (f) condition precedent); § 572B.15 (arbitration process — subsection (c), notice and objection); § 572B.19 (award — subsection (a), record and notice of the award; subsection (b), time for the award, incorporated by § 572B.23(c) for a rehearing); § 572B.20 (change of award by arbitrator — subsection (a) grounds, subsection (b) 20-day motion, subsection (c) 10-day objections, subsection (d) court submission while a motion is pending, subsection (e) modified award subject to §§ 572B.22–.24); § 572B.22 (confirmation of award); § 572B.23 (vacating award — subsection (a)(1)–(6) grounds quoted in full, subsection (b) 90-day deadline and its three triggers, subsection (c) rehearing, subsection (d) confirm on denial); § 572B.24 (modification or correction of award — subsection (a)(1)–(3) grounds and 90-day deadline, subsection (b) confirm as modified or otherwise confirm, subsection (c) joinder with a vacatur motion); § 572B.25 (judgment on award; attorney fees and litigation expenses — subsections (a), (b), and (c)); § 572B.26 (jurisdiction — subsection (b)); § 572B.27 (venue); § 572B.28 (appeals — subsection (a)(1)–(6) and subsection (b)); § 572B.29 (uniformity; No-Fault Automobile Insurance Act; conflict — subsection (b)) — all from the Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes, 2025 Minnesota Statutes. Chapter 572B has been amended twice since its 2010 enactment: § 572B.04 by 2014 c 275 art 1 s 127, and § 572B.17 — not relied on here — by 2023 c 53 art 11 s 58. Every other section relied on here carries a single History line citing only 2010 c 264 art 1. The Revisor’s Statutes Changed table (Table 2) records no action of any kind on chapter 572B during the 2026 Regular Session. Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 104.01, subd. 1 (60 days from entry of judgment; 60 days from service of written notice of filing of an appealable order, unless a different time is provided by statute) and Rule 103.03(g) together with the advisory committee comment to Rule 103.03 (arbitration proceedings “are not ‘special’ proceedings under Rule 103.03,” citing Pulju) — Minnesota Court Rules, Rules of Civil Appellate Procedure, rule text read from the Office of the Revisor of Statutes court-rules pages at revisor.mn.gov/court_rules/ap/subtype/rcap/id/103/ and /104/.

Seagate Technology, LLC v. Western Digital Corp., 854 N.W.2d 750 (Minn. Oct. 8, 2014) (No. A12-1944) (affirming the court of appeals and reinstating the award in full; at 754 n.1, the reference mark for which is called at 754, §§ 572.09, 572.12, and 572.19 replaced by §§ 572B.07, 572B.15, and 572B.23, “which contain substantially similar language”; at 759, an objection during arbitration is required only for challenges under subdivision 1(5), and the passage on limited appeal rights, absent transcripts, and nonlawyer arbitrators; at 760–61, quoting Children’s Hospital, Inc. v. Minnesota Nurses Ass’n, 265 N.W.2d 649, 652 (Minn. 1978), for the objecting party’s burden to show the arbitrators “clearly exceeded the powers granted to them in the arbitration agreement” and “courts will not overturn an award merely because they may disagree with the arbitrators’ decision on the merits”; at 761, “[e]very reasonable presumption is exercised in favor of the finality and validity of the award”; at 762, an arbitrator “cannot expand his authority beyond what could reasonably be interpreted from the arbitration agreement”; at 764, “Where the arbitrators are not restricted by the submission to decide according to principles of law, they may make an award according to their own notion of justice without regard to the law” (quoting Metropolitan Waste Control Commission v. City of Minnetonka) and “an award will not be vacated merely because the court may believe the arbitrators erred”; at 766–67, subdivision 1(4) concerns admissibility and the conduct of the hearing, not the use of evidence in fashioning an award; at 767, the challenge was “outside the scope” of that provision), Caselaw Access Project. Seagate Technology, LLC v. Western Digital Corp., 834 N.W.2d 555 (Minn. App. July 22, 2013) (No. A12-1944), aff’d, 854 N.W.2d 750 (Minn. 2014) (at 565 n.8, the reference mark for which is called at 565, “The Minnesota Supreme Court has not expressly adopted or even addressed the manifest-disregard doctrine, and this court has not embraced it,” and that the doctrine “may no longer be available as a basis separate from those bases articulated in the FAA”), Caselaw Access Project. In re the Arbitration between Hunter, Keith Industries, Inc. v. Piper Capital Management Inc., 575 N.W.2d 850 (Minn. App. Mar. 17, 1998) (No. C3-97-1796) (Lansing, J.) (at 852, the issue “Is manifest disregard of the law a basis for overturning an arbitration award in Minnesota?”; at 855, “Piper contends this court should apply the doctrine of manifest disregard for the law” and “the Eighth Circuit has not used manifest disregard of the law as a basis for overturning arbitration awards”; at 856, “Separate from the question of whether Minnesota should recognize the manifest disregard doctrine . . .”; at 857, “An arbitration panel that incorrectly interpreted the law has not manifestly disregarded it; it has simply made a legal mistake” and “Minnesota courts have not formally adopted the public policy exception”), Caselaw Access Project. State, Office of the State Auditor v. Minnesota Ass’n of Professional Employees, 504 N.W.2d 751 (Minn. Aug. 20, 1993) (No. C9-92-990) (at 752, the question whether to recognize a public policy exception; at 754, the Cournoyer rule and “Every reasonable presumption must be exercised in favor of the finality and validity of the arbitration award”; at 755, “Thus, the scope of judicial review of an arbitration award is extremely narrow”), Caselaw Access Project. Cournoyer v. American Television & Radio Co., 249 Minn. 577, 580 (1957) (No. 37,040) (the arbitrator as “the final judge of both law and fact, including the interpretation of the terms of any contract,” and no set-aside “for mistake of either law or fact”; parallel citation 83 N.W.2d 409, the page 411 pin taken from the Minnesota Supreme Court’s own citation of the passage in Hennepin Healthcare), Caselaw Access Project. Component Systems, Inc. v. Murray Enterprises of Minnesota, Inc., 300 Minn. 21 (1974) (No. 44293) (at 24, “The act plainly requires that an application to vacate an award must be made within 90 days after delivery of the award to the applicant”; at 25, “the trial court was obliged to confirm the award,” the rejection of vacatur grounds raised in an answer to a confirmation motion, and “no application to vacate on that ground was made within the 90-day statutory period”; parallel citation 217 N.W.2d 514, for which no page pin is given because none was verified), Caselaw Access Project. Crosby-Ironton Federation of Teachers, Local 1325 v. Independent School District No. 182, 285 N.W.2d 667 (Minn. Oct. 12, 1979) (No. 49355) (at 669, “It is well settled that statutory arbitration must comply with the requirements of the governing statute”; at 670, “this court has strictly enforced the 90-day time limit for applications to vacate an award,” collecting Wacker, Component Systems, and Ehlert), Caselaw Access Project. All Metro Supply, Inc. v. Warner, 707 N.W.2d 1 (Minn. App. Nov. 22, 2005) (No. A05-446) (Dietzen, J.) (at 4, the 20-day limit “is strictly construed”; at 5, “Because the time limits in the arbitration statute are jurisdictional, the district court lacked authority” to act after the window closed) — decided under the predecessor act, Minn. Stat. ch. 572 (2004), Caselaw Access Project. Northwest Mechanical, Inc. v. Public Utilities Commission of the City of Virginia, 283 N.W.2d 522 (Minn. Aug. 24, 1979) (No. 49165) (Sheran, C.J.) (at 523, the arbitrators’ connections to the city and the court’s acknowledgment that the relationships were “neither uninterrupted nor of a magnitude making bias inevitable,” that “one could hardly expect any less interrelationship in a city the size of Virginia,” and “Nor is there any claim of fraud or attempted concealment or any challenge to the merits of the award”; at 524, the contacts were “dealings that might create an impression of possible bias” and “were not disclosed to the parties as required by Commonwealth Coatings,” and the holding that the federal arbitration statute applied) — the reference mark for footnote 1 is called at 523, Caselaw Access Project. L & H Airco, Inc. v. Rapistan Corp., 446 N.W.2d 372 (Minn. Oct. 6, 1989) (Keith, J.) (at 377, majority opinion: “Our decision does not leave aggrieved parties remediless, however,” and “We believe the proper remedy lies therein rather than in a civil suit against the arbitrator”), Caselaw Access Project. Pulju v. Metropolitan Property & Casualty, 535 N.W.2d 608 (Minn. July 21, 1995) (No. CX-95-723) (order opinion, Keith, C.J.) (at 608–09, reversing and reinstating the appeal, and rejecting the court of appeals’ declaration “that arbitration proceedings are ‘special proceedings’ within the meaning of Minn.R.Civ.App.P. 103.03(g)”), rev’g 532 N.W.2d 592 (Minn. App. June 6, 1995) (special term opinion applying a 30-day appeal period on the special-proceedings theory), both Caselaw Access Project.

Hennepin Healthcare System, Inc. v. AFSCME Minnesota Council 5, No. A21-1079 (Minn. May 17, 2023) (Moore, III, J.) (slip op. at 2, the court of appeals “erroneously substituted its own judgment for that of the arbitrator”; at 6, “The Minnesota Uniform Arbitration Act provides limited grounds upon which a court may vacate an arbitration award”; at 7, quoting Seagate at 761 and Cournoyer, 83 N.W.2d at 411; at 8, the essence test and the phrase “evince[] a manifest disregard” of the collective bargaining agreement, quoting Ramsey County v. AFSCME, Council 91, Local 8, 309 N.W.2d 785, 792 (Minn. 1981); at 13, the essence test “is not a means for parties to call upon courts to carefully review the merits of an arbitrator’s interpretation”) and Minnesota Department of Corrections v. Knutson, No. A21-0300 (Minn. June 29, 2022) (Chutich, J.) (slip op. at 3, “Knutson and the Department did not agree to arbitrate so the Uniform Arbitration Act does not apply,” and the section 43A.33 decision “is reviewable by certiorari because it is a final, quasi-judicial disposition of the rights of Knutson and the Department that is not otherwise reviewable”; at 7, “the plain language of the Uniform Arbitration Act shows that it only applies to agreements to arbitrate contained in a record, i.e., agreements that are written or similarly stored in electronic form” — all quotations taken from the opinion body, not the syllabus at slip op. 1–2) — both read in full from the Minnesota Judicial Branch’s published slip-opinion archive at mn.gov/law-library-stat/archive/supct/. No North Western Reporter citation is given for either decision because none was independently verified; the Caselaw Access Project archive ends at 932 N.W.2d, roughly mid-2020, and does not contain them.

Hall Street Associates, L.L.C. v. Mattel, Inc., 552 U.S. 576 (2008) (Souter, J.) (at 578, “We hold that the statutory grounds are exclusive”; at 586, “the text compels a reading of the §§10 and 11 categories as exclusive”; at 590, the reservation that the Court did “not purport to say that they exclude more searching review based on authority outside the statute as well” and that parties “may contemplate enforcement under state statutory or common law, for example, where judicial review of different scope is arguable” — quotations taken from the opinion body, not the syllabus), and Medicine Shoppe International, Inc. v. Turner Investments, Inc., 614 F.3d 485 (8th Cir. July 21, 2010) (No. 09-2179) (at 489, “an arbitral award may be vacated only for the reasons enumerated in the FAA,” and that such claims, including the claim “that the arbitrator disregarded the law,” “are not included among those specifically enumerated in § 10 and are therefore not cognizable”), both Caselaw Access Project.

On the negative stated in the text — that no Minnesota appellate decision has adopted manifest disregard of the law as an independent ground for vacatur — the phrase was run against Minnesota Supreme Court and Court of Appeals opinions in five formulations (“manifest disregard of the law”; “manifest disregard”; “disregard of the law” with arbitrator and award; the statutory phrasing of § 572B.23 and former § 572.19 with “error of law”; and “exceeded the arbitrator’s powers” for the years since 2020), every published Minnesota hit was read, and the only decision presenting the question is Hunter, Keith, which declined it. Because the case archive relied on here ends in mid-2020, the Minnesota Judicial Branch’s published opinions from 2020 forward were searched separately for decisions on vacatur, evident partiality, and the scope of § 572B.23, and the two found — Hennepin Healthcare (2023) and Knutson (2022) — were retrieved and read from the court’s own slip PDFs. Neither adopts the doctrine.

This article is general legal information about Minnesota and federal law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship. Whether chapter 572B or the Federal Arbitration Act governs a particular award, and whether any ground for vacatur exists, depends on the arbitration agreement and the record of the proceeding. No outcome is promised or implied.