In short
Dispute Neutral, part of Raspberry Global Group, was set up by people who had faced the same slow, costly options for commercial debt disputes as small businesses. It gives a private, binding written decision by an independent lawyer, on documents, for a fixed fee, on commercial disputes up to £150,000. It is not a court, law firm or debt collector.
Key facts
- Fees plus VAT: £650 up to £4,000, £900 to £10,000, £1,200 to £25,000, £1,500 to £150,000.
- Covers disputes between businesses up to £150,000 in England & Wales and Northern Ireland, if both parties agree.
- Decisions are binding save for fraud or manifest error and are enforceable as a contractual debt.
- Dispute Neutral does not collect debts, give legal advice or represent either party.
- Taking part is not an admission that money is owed, and decisions do not appear on a public register.
We Built This Because We Needed It
Dispute Neutral did not start as a business idea on a whiteboard. It started as a frustration.
Like many people who deal with commercial disputes — whether as business owners, professionals, or people who have tried to navigate the system on behalf of others — we found ourselves confronting the same problem again and again: the existing options for resolving a commercial debt dispute are either too slow, too expensive, too uncertain, or all three.
We looked at the routes available. Court was costly and slow, with no guarantee of actually recovering money even if you won. Solicitors were often proportionate to large disputes but crushing to small ones. Mediation was useful in some cases, but it depends entirely on goodwill and produces no binding outcome unless the parties settle. Debt collection agencies were blunt instruments that damaged relationships and often recovered pennies in the pound.
And throughout all of it, there was this persistent assumption: that proper, credible, professionally delivered dispute resolution had to be expensive. That quality meant complexity. That if you wanted something done properly, you would pay for it — indefinitely, and without knowing how much it would eventually cost. We did not accept that. So we built something different.
What 'Cheap' Actually Means Here
When people see a low fixed fee for a professional service, the instinct is understandable: is this too good to be true? Is there a catch? Is the quality going to reflect the price?
These are fair questions. But they rest on an assumption that does not hold in every market: that price and quality always move together. In traditional dispute resolution, price reflects a cost model — hourly rates, multiple professionals involved, long processes, extensive correspondence, and overhead built for large-value commercial disputes. That cost model is often justified at scale. At the level of a £15,000 unpaid invoice or a £40,000 professional fee dispute, it simply does not make sense.
Dispute Neutral's fixed fee is low not because we cut corners, but because we designed the service from scratch to work efficiently at the scale it is intended for. We stripped out everything that does not add value. We built a process that is structured, straightforward, and focused on reaching a proper determination without unnecessary steps.
Every decision under Dispute Neutral is made by an independent lawyer with at least 15 years' practical experience, acting as an expert, not an arbitrator. The process is rigorous. The outcome is binding. None of that changes because the fee is proportionate.
The System Was Not Built for Small Commercial Disputes
The legal system in England and Wales is, in many respects, world-class. But it was not designed with the SME in mind when it comes to commercial debt recovery. The small claims track has a £10,000 limit for most claims. Above that come the fast track, the intermediate track (claims of £25,000 to £100,000, since 1 October 2023) and the multi-track, with procedural requirements and timescales that make litigation a serious undertaking rather than a practical remedy. Fixed recoverable costs on the fast and intermediate tracks limit what either side can recover from the other, but each side's own legal costs can still outweigh what the claim is worth. Northern Ireland has its own courts and rules, with a small claims limit of £5,000.
The result is a gap. A business owed £30,000, £60,000, or £100,000 by a customer who disputes the invoice faces a choice between expensive formal litigation or writing the debt off. Neither is acceptable. Neither is fair.
GOV.UK confirms that businesses can claim statutory interest on late commercial payments at 8% above the Bank of England base rate (the rate in force on the 31 December or 30 June before the debt fell due, fixed for that debt), and can add fixed recovery sums of £40, £70, or £100 depending on the size of the debt. But guidance alone does not resolve a dispute. It does not produce a binding decision. It does not recover the money.
Dispute Neutral fills that gap. A private, professional, binding process for commercial debts up to £150,000. Not court. Not mediation. Not a debt collection agency. Something purpose-built for the problem.
Built on Principle, Not Just Profit
We are not pretending to be neutral about what we have built — we think it is genuinely better for most SME debt disputes than the alternatives. But we are clear-eyed about why.
We set the price where we did because we wanted it to be accessible. A service that costs so much that only certain businesses can use it is not really solving the problem — it is just moving the barrier slightly. We wanted a sole trader, a small agency, a consultancy, or a school to be able to access the same quality of process as a larger business. That meant fixed fees, set in bands by the amount in dispute (all plus VAT): £650 up to £4,000, £900 from £4,001 to £10,000, £1,200 from £10,001 to £25,000, and £1,500 from £25,001 to £150,000 or for a commercial decision not about money. Each side's written case is limited to between 15 and 50 pages, depending on the band. That meant no hourly rates. That meant no surprises.
We also knew from experience that speed matters. When you are owed money, every week of delay has a real cost — to cash flow, to staff, to confidence. A Dispute Neutral decision is issued within 10 business days of the matter being ready, which is usually much faster than court. Not because we rush the process, but because we designed it to move efficiently.
Why the Receiving Party Should Also Welcome This
We are sometimes asked: why would a debtor — the party who owes money — agree to Dispute Neutral? If they are resisting the claim, surely they would rather take their chances in court?
The answer depends on what the receiving party actually wants. If they have a genuine dispute about the invoice — if they believe the work was not done properly, that the amount is wrong, or that there are legitimate grounds to resist the claim — Dispute Neutral gives them a proper forum to make that case. An independent lawyer, with no prior relationship to either side, will read their case carefully and give it proper weight. They get a full opportunity to put their case in writing.
Compare that to the alternatives. A county court claim is public record. A County Court Judgment (CCJ) affects credit ratings and business reputation. Court proceedings involve costs, uncertainty, and time. Even if a defendant ultimately wins in court, the process is painful and expensive.
Dispute Neutral is private. It is proportionate. It gives both sides a full opportunity to put their case in writing, and a binding outcome. The receiving party does not have to be the loser in that equation — if their case is sound, the determination will reflect it.
We say this directly to any receiving party considering whether to engage: participating in Dispute Neutral is not an admission that you owe the money. It is a decision to resolve the matter properly, fairly, and privately. See our full page on why Dispute Neutral works for defendants.
What We Are Not
- We are not a debt collection agency. We do not buy debts, chase debtors by phone, or use pressure tactics. We do not threaten. We do not negotiate on your behalf.
- We are not a law firm. We do not provide legal advice. We do not represent either party or draft documents for them. We do publish model clauses that businesses can add to their own terms, in the Include us section.
- We are not a court. We are not part of the court system and we do not issue judgments that appear on a public register.
What we are is a structured, professional, private dispute resolution service. We provide a binding decision from an independent lawyer with at least 15 years' practical experience, acting as an expert, not an arbitrator, on written submissions, at a fixed fee banded by claim size, for commercial debts between businesses up to £150,000 in England and Wales and Northern Ireland, where both parties agree to use it. We do not currently accept disputes involving consumers. That is it. No more and no less. And we think that is exactly what most SMEs actually need.
The Case for Trusting a Newer Kind of Service
We understand that trust is earned. For businesses dealing with a significant unpaid debt — one that may represent weeks or months of revenue — the decision to use a new kind of service rather than a familiar one is not trivial.
What we ask is simple: look at the process, not the price. Ask whether the outcome is binding. Ask whether the decision-maker is qualified. Ask whether the process is fair to both sides. Ask whether the fee is proportionate to the debt you are trying to recover.
We are confident in the answers to all of those questions. And we believe that once you understand what Dispute Neutral actually is — and why it was built — the price will make sense in a way it would not if we had simply copied an existing model and charged accordingly.
Affordable does not mean low quality. It means we designed something that should have existed already and priced it the way it should always have been priced: fairly.
Find out how Dispute Neutral works
A faster, fairer, and more proportionate route to recovering what you are owed, when both parties agree to use it — without court, without solicitors, without the wait.
How it works Start a matter →Private • Fixed fees • Binding decision within 10 business days of the matter being ready