The British Columbia Court of Appeal holds that any party seeking to cross appeal an award must do so within the same 30-day deadline that applies to an appeal of an arbitral award.

Facts

At issue in Sinclair was the procedural time limits for bringing a cross appeal of an arbitral award made under British Columbia’s Arbitration Act, SBC 2020 c 2 (“Arbitration Act”).

Section 60(1) of the Arbitration Act provides that generally any appeal of an arbitral award must be brought not more than 30 days after the date the award is received. In BC, a party may appeal an arbitral award under the Arbitration Act to the BC Court of Appeal on a question of law. The BC Court of Appeal Rules, BC Reg 120/2022 (the “Rules”) provide that a cross appeal must be brought within 15 days of service of the appellants’ notice of appeal.

In the underlying arbitration, the arbitral award was issued on May 28, 2025. The appellants, Sinclair et al., filed a notice of appeal and their application for leave to appeal to the BC Court of Appeal on June 27, 2025, just within the 30-day deadline for an appeal of an arbitral award.

The respondents, TDMC Holdings Ltd. et al., then filed a notice of cross appeal (leave required) on July 14, 2025, outside the Arbitration Act’s 30-day timeline for bringing an appeal, but within the 15-day timeline prescribed by the Rules. The respondents did not file their application for leave until August 13, 2025—well beyond the 30-day deadline.

The appellants applied to quash the cross appeal on the basis that it was brought beyond the 30-day limit. A single justice of the BC Court of Appeal in chambers dismissed the application (2025 BCCA 322), reasoning that once an arbitral appeal is commenced, the Rules govern procedure and the 15‑day timeline in the Rules applied. The appellants sought to vary that order before a division of the Court of Appeal. 

Decision

The Court of Appeal allowed the application to vary the order and quashed the respondents’ cross-appeal for being out of time.

The central question on appeal was whether, having filed their cross appeal beyond the 30-day timeline provided for by the Arbitration Act, the respondents were out of time, or whether they were saved by the 15-day timeline in the Rules.

As a statutory court, the Court of Appeal’s sole jurisdiction to hear any appeal of an arbitral award derives from the Arbitration Act. The Court therefore does not have jurisdiction to extend the deadline for bringing a cross appeal beyond what the Arbitration Act provides.

The Court reasoned that the issue therefore turned on a question of statutory interpretation: is there a distinction between an “appeal” and a “cross appeal” as those terms are used in the Arbitration Act? The Court concluded, as a matter of statutory interpretation, there is not. To hold otherwise, the Court reasoned, would be untenable given the use of “appellant” in other provisions in the Arbitration Act.

In reaching its conclusion, the Court acknowledged the very real practical considerations militating in favour of finding that the 30-day timeline does not apply to cross appeals. The Court recognized that parties may be perversely incentivized to bring cross appeals to preserve rights when they would not have otherwise done so.

Noting this, the Court urged BC’s Legislature to consider amending the Arbitration Act to expressly include a separate time limit for the filing of a cross appeal.

Analysis

The key takeaway from Sinclair is a bright-line rule on deadlines for any appeal of an arbitral award. Regardless of whether a party wishes to bring an appeal or a cross appeal, it must be brought within 30 days of receipt of the arbitral award.

Strategically, this has several implications.

First, parties cannot wait for service of a notice of appeal before making their own decision regarding whether to appeal; all parties must make early, potentially parallel assessments of appeal issues and preserve rights within the same 30‑day period. Counsel should prepare to scrutinize an arbitral award immediately upon receipt to examine whether a party wishes to challenge any aspect of the award, regardless of whether the other side may choose to appeal. Counsel should also be prepared to consider commencing an appeal to preserve rights where the decision to pursue the appeal might depend on whether the counterparty also launches an appeal.

The Court urged the Legislature to amend the Arbitration Act, but there is no guarantee that it will act on the suggestion. Unless and until the Arbitration Act is amended, parties should make note of the day of receipt of the arbitral award and ensure any appeal is brought within the 30-day deadline. This decision may also be seen as persuasive authority in most other Canadian jurisdictions whose domestic arbitration statutes provide for an appeal deadline (i.e., do not rely on the rules of court or other statutes to provide one).

As an aside, the Court in Sinclair did not settle the question of whether a notice of appeal and an application for leave to appeal must both be brought within the 30-day timeline. The Court declined to decide the issue. Until the matter is settled, either by the Legislature or in a subsequent appellate decision, counsel should file both a notice of appeal and application for leave within 30 days of receipt of the arbitrator’s award.

Sinclair v. T.D.M.C. Holdings Ltd., 2025 BCCA 402