The risk is always in the fine print nobody read.
Most commercial disputes begin with a clause that went unquestioned at signing. Read your contract the way a senior lawyer would, one clause at a time, and get a written risk commentary on the eight areas that cause the most trouble.
Turn this snapshot into certainty
A snapshot flags where to look. A review by a senior lawyer tells you exactly what to change and how to negotiate it. RMOK Legal reviews commercial contracts for a fixed fee, confirmed before any work begins, from £400 +VAT.
This tool gives general information based on the answers you provide. It is not legal advice and does not create a solicitor-client relationship. Every contract turns on its specific wording and context. For advice on your situation, speak to a qualified solicitor. RMOK Legal is authorised and their solicitors are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
What to check in a commercial contract before you sign
Before signing any commercial contract, the risk is rarely in the parts you read closely. It is in the clauses that look standard and go unquestioned. Most disputes trace back to a single provision, a liability cap, an indemnity, a renewal term, that nobody scrutinised at the point of signing. A contract review means reading each of those clauses deliberately and asking what it would mean if it were ever tested.
This checker walks through the eight areas that most often carry hidden risk in SaaS, technology, outsourcing, AI and general commercial agreements. Each is a place where the wording quietly decides who carries the cost when something goes wrong.
The eight clauses that carry the most risk
- §1 Limitation of liability. Whether liability is capped, whether the cap applies to both sides, and what it carves out. An uncapped or one-sided cap is the most common and costly thing to miss.
- §2 Indemnities. Whether you are giving one, and whether it is capped. Indemnities often sit outside the main liability cap, so an uncapped indemnity can become the largest exposure in the whole agreement.
- §3 Intellectual property. Who owns the work product, configurations and outputs created under the contract, including anything produced by or with AI.
- §4 Data protection. Whether there is a data processing agreement that meets UK GDPR, and how liability for a data breach is treated, since that is frequently excluded from the cap.
- §5 Term and termination. Whether you can exit on reasonable notice, and what the notice period is. The absence of a termination-for-convenience right can lock you in.
- §6 Automatic renewal. Whether the contract rolls over automatically, at what price, and what notice is needed to stop it.
- §7 AI provisions. Where AI is involved, whether the contract allocates training data rights, output ownership, and liability for AI errors, and whether it addresses EU AI Act compliance.
- §8 Audit rights and service levels. Whether there are mechanisms to hold the other side to account if performance slips.
When to get a contract reviewed by a lawyer
A checker like this tells you where to look. It cannot read your actual wording, and the real risk always lives in the specific drafting. For any agreement with significant value, a multi-year commitment, intellectual property implications or regulatory exposure, a professional review is worth the cost, which is almost always a fraction of the cost of a dispute later.
RMOK Legal provides commercial contract review for a fixed fee from £400 plus VAT, confirmed before any work begins, handled personally by a senior solicitor with over 20 years of experience. If you would like your contract reviewed properly, you can book a free discovery call.