For some reason (I never dug deeper), my friend who is an attorney said she prefers arbitration. Maybe because she already is an attorney? The only thing I can think of is that it is more expedient and having seen behind the curtain the talk of biased arbiters (biased towards the Goliath) are exaggerated. But if anyone can opine I'm all ears.
I've yet to hear a single valid reason for forced arbitration. I have nothing against two parties, at the time of a dispute, who want to engage in arbitration, in doing so.
There's also numerous stuff that should, IMO, fall into class action, but gets divvied up in forced arbitration, to the point where it isn't worth the time and expense for the individuals in the class to continue to pursue justice. (Although there have been some novel DoS style mass-arbitrations … that's more of a means of trying to force the corporations hand into a normal class action, and towards justice.)
Normally the reasons cited for arbitration are things like "the courts are slow" or "the courts are expensive" or "the courts are overwhelmed" — but you could still just do arbitration at the time of dispute with those. Saying that forced arbitration is better from these arguments is non sequitur.
There's also a conflict of interest between the chosen arbiter and the company. (And conflict of interest is independent of bias; a good arbiter can very well be unbiased, but it is easier for everyone involved to believe that if there isn't a conflict of interest.)
I’ve heard this from attorneys. The gist is: arbitration/mediation make sure the case is settled quickly. Big corporations can afford attorneys to appeal and appeal and appeal. With arbitration that does happen.
Arbitration can also be more expensive than a court case. In many jurisdictions the cost to file a complaint is less than $100 but arbitration can cost $2500+ to file and sometimes you still have to compensate the arbitrator even if you win.
