Appeal from an order of the Civil Court of the City of New York, Queens County (Leslie J. Purificacion, J.), entered October 9, 2007. The order denied plaintiff's motion to vacate the dismissal of the action and to confirm the arbitration award.

On the court's own motion, the action is converted to a proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 75.

Order affirmed without costs.

Plaintiff commenced the instant action to enforce an arbitration award. The record indicates that at a pre-trial conference on September 26, 2006, the matter was marked final for trial on January 31, 2007. On the latter date, plaintiff failed to appear, and the action was dismissed. Thereafter, plaintiff moved to vacate the dismissal of the action and to confirm the arbitration award. By order entered October 9, 2007, the court denied plaintiff's motion, and the instant appeal ensued.

The proper procedure to enforce an arbitration award arising out of a written agreement to arbitrate is a special proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 75 (see Scaduto v DT Indus., 266 AD2d 149 [1999]; Polednak v Country-Wide Ins. Co., 153 AD2d 930 [1989]). Consequently, the instant action is converted into a proceeding (see CPLR 103 [b]; Scaduto v DT Indus., 266 AD2d 149 [1999], supra; Polednak v Country-Wide Ins. Co., 153 AD2d 930 [1989], supra).

Since plaintiff failed to demonstrate a reasonable excuse for its failure to appear at trial (see Psomatithis v Transoceanic Cable Ship Co., Inc., 39 AD3d 837 [2007]), the court below did not improvidently exercise its discretion in denying plaintiff's motion.

Weston Patterson, J.P., Golia and Steinhardt, JJ., concur. [*2]
Decision Date: November 21, 2008