RIPE NCC Appeals Procedure

[Daniel Karrenberg <]

The issue of defining an appeals procedure for registration decisions
has been raised to me in the context of the new organisational structure
for the NCC.  Some feel that such a procedure should be defined as part
of defining the new structure.  I will air my personal ideas about this
as a means to find out if I am on the right track and to spawn
discussion if necessary. 

First of all I must stress that up to now we have been lucky and there
was no need for such a procedure.  Of course some of this luck is a
consequence of the high standards of expertise and neutrality to which
NCC regisrtration services work. 

Nonetheless it is a good idea to have a procedure ready when needed.  
My current personal idea is for the NCC contributors, the GA in the new
organisation, to define this procedure. 

For instance the GA could select a pool of about a dozen arbitrators who
are well respected in the community and agree to serve as the need
arises.  When there is a conflict both parties select an arbitrator from
the pool.  Those both select a third with whom they form the appeals
panel for that particular conflict.  The panel then hears both parties
and quickly suggests a way to resolve the conflict. 

The important principle is that the GA defines the procedure and can
change it if necessary.  The procedure itself should not be codified in
the statutes of the new organisation because that makes adapting it 
unnecessarily difficult. Also the discussion about the details of the
procedure, while important, need not be coupled to that about the new
organisational structure.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards

Daniel Karrenberg
RIPE NCC Manager