What is the Fairway Negotiated Resolution Plan™
The Fairway Negotiated Resolution Plan™ is a detailed written divorce mediation report that records every decision made throughout the INR™ process. It explains how each decision was reached: what information both parties reviewed, what calculations were considered, what both spouses understood before agreeing.
Where a decision falls outside what is standard under family law , that deviation is clearly flagged and explained, with the reasoning that supports it. As a result, this agreement is far more transparent and durable than those produced by the traditional adversarial process.
The Resolution Plan covers the full financial settlement: property division, asset allocation, equalization payment, spousal support, and child support. It includes the complete Nurtured Children Plan™: the parenting schedule, decision-making arrangements, parenting time, holiday provisions, and all other matters relating to the children.
The document is prepared on a without-prejudice basis, which means it is confidential and cannot be submitted as evidence if the mediation process were ever to break down. Every version is watermarked as DRAFT until both parties have reviewed and confirmed it. Nothing is finalized until both spouses have signed off.
Why the storytelling matters
The Resolution Plan is different from a standard legal document because it doesn’t just list the agreements, but how they were reached. This context protects both spouses long after the divorce process is complete. It is much harder to challenge a settlement when the record shows clearly that both parties were informed, and that the agreement was reached with a complete understanding of the relevant facts.
It is also what makes the independent legal advice stage significantly smoother. When both family lawyers receive the Resolution Plan alongside the formal separation agreement, then they have the full picture and the questions that might slow things down have already been answered.
In the traditional system, legal agreements capture what was agreed, e.g. the house went to this party, the spousal support payment is this amount for this duration, but they rarely explain why. If a dispute arises months or years later, there is often no record of the information both spouses had at the time, or why a particular settlement made sense.
The Fairway Negotiated Resolution Plan™ tells the full story:
- How the family home was valued and what methodology both spouses agreed to use.
- What spousal support calculations were reviewed and why the amount chosen reflects both parties' situations.
- What both spouses understood about their pension entitlements before agreeing to the division.
- Why a particular property was treated as excluded and what both parties knew about that at the time.
This is one of the most important differentiators between the Fairway divorce process and any other form of family dispute resolution available in Canada.
