Posted by Jon
Any of you suffer from paranoid corporate lawyers? BJ’s written before about legal disclaimers that create entirely the wrong impression at the outset of the document – the sort of thing which, when paraphrased, probably reads to the customer as:
Any of you suffer from paranoid corporate lawyers? BJ’s written before about legal disclaimers that create entirely the wrong impression at the outset of the document – the sort of thing which, when paraphrased, probably reads to the customer as:
“We do not trust you. We think you will steal our ideas. And no matter how much this document talks about ‘partnership’, remember that our legal team are always lurking menacingly in the shadows.”
I thought you might enjoy two recent examples encountered by our UK team, as shared on our internal social networking site (Yammer)…
First up, an ITT question: “Please indicate your process for responding to proposals or quotations.”
The answer, submitted to the proposal team by their company lawyer: “We do not provide quotations or proposals”.
First up, an ITT question: “Please indicate your process for responding to proposals or quotations.”
The answer, submitted to the proposal team by their company lawyer: “We do not provide quotations or proposals”.
And then disclaimer at the front of a different document:
“This document is not an offer, nor does any part of it represent an offer and nor does anything which may be construed as an offer constitute an offer of any form.”
The simple copyright statement provides you with so much legal protection. But if you are pressured to include anything more, why not make it more friendly by adopting a mutual stance: “Just as we have treated the information that you have provided to us as confidential, we trust you will do the same with the material we have included in this proposal. Thank you.”
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