Rather than blinding leaping onto the digital bandwagon, STOP! Let’s consider if you are ready for or even need digital contracts. I’ve been speaking to Mo Shana’a from Morta regarding questions he asks a company to see if they are motivated to change their current ways of working. Imposed changes
There is no specific format for contracts under English law. They can be verbal, written or in any other format. Five essentials A hasty scribble on a serviette can form a legally-binding contract, providing it covers the five essential elements (English law): Offer to do something Acceptance of that offer
5000 years ago, most contracts were oral, scratched into clay tablets with a reed or laboriously transcribed onto animal skins or papyrus. In our modern, hyper-connected world – the digital age – you can create a contract in many different ways: Paper-based (hard copy) Electronic (soft copy) Digital (created, signed
Your clients no longer need to sign on the dotted line… or more accurately not with a pen. The Law Commission has recently confirmed that e-signatures are a valid means of executing contracts. No more printing, signing, scanning and emailing an attachment back to complete the steps of acceptance. All
Digital construction, like BIM, has no universal definition. Digital construction is the use and application of digital tools to improve the process of delivering and operating the built environment [B1M] Digital construction includes – but is not limited to – Building Information Modelling; although technology is one of the 4
My talk at the 2017 CoMIT Conference (read the live blog) drew parallels between banking and construction because banking was based on trust (hence the term ‘rich as Croesus’ as he mastered the art of trustworthy coins as tools to stimulate commerce in Lydia). The former chair of JCT said
Although 86% of the audience at the 2017 CoMIT Conference (read the live blog) did not think language was the biggest barrier to digital contracts, we cannot automate our current contracts. The problems include: Jargon: the legal language is one-sided and full of jargon so the obligations are not universally
At the 2017 CoMIT conference (read the live blog), I proposed that the three barriers to moving towards digital contracts were technology, language and conduct. Unsurprisingly for an audience attending a conference on the construction opportunities for mobile IT, 75% said technology would be the first barrier to digital contracts
The Winfield Rock Report Overcoming the Legal and Contractual Barriers of BIM reported that BIM aficionados expressed ‘sympathy for lawyers having to wade through endless jargon’. Te he he! For once the boot is on the other foot. I spend my life helping professionals overcome jargon: writing jargon-free contracts, training
The Winfield Rock Report Overcoming the Legal and Contractual Barriers of BIM [available here] is a great step-forward in explaining both the essentials of BIM and the barriers to its adoption. As a contract and plain language specialist, the Report chimes with my experience: too much jargon too many initialisms
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