Rule 3.891 Actions subject to mediation

A court can send a case to mediation when the amount of money being disputed is $50,000 or less per plaintiff. Before doing this, the court will consider what the parties think about mediation. The court cannot force the parties to show up in person just to decide whether mediation is right for their case.

If the disputed amount is more than $50,000, the parties can still choose mediation on their own. They just need to agree in writing and file that agreement at least 90 days before the trial date.

The court looks at each case separately to decide if mediation makes sense. There is no blanket rule that automatically sends certain types of cases to mediation.