This is a small utility program for MS Word. Tell me the price, let me do a demo (by myself, with the full version) and don’t waste my billable time with sales reps. Sorry, West.

It can help to catch some of the errors (e.g., cross-references and numbering) that tend to creep into a contract draft as it goes through the negotiation and editing processes. Since many lawyers don’t use automatic numbering, and few lawyers use automatic cross references, these kinds of errors are introduced all the time, and they are often overlooked in the haste to get a deal done. Deal Proof would catch many of them.

The other place where I think Deal Proof can add value is in reviewing a contract that was drafted by someone else. It doesn’t take the place of manual proofreading, but it can catch many of the little things that are easy to overlook when you’re trying to understand a lengthy contract you’ve never seen before. Something like inconsistent use of definitions can be hard to spot in a long document, and Deal Proof does a decent job of finding those kinds of errors.

The biggest problem I see with Deal Proof is not a problem with the software itself. It’s that it’s one more software tool that people have to take the time to learn and then take the time to use it routinely. In my experience, most lawyers are simply not going to spend the time to adopt another software tool, even if it would save them time in the long run.

You could give Deal Proof to an assistant and let them use if for a first pass at proofreading, but much of the value of the tool would be lost since someone will still have to make a judgment call on many of the issues Deal Proof will spot.

I applaud Fred for using Deal Proof to help in improving the quality of his firm’s contracts, but I don’t think most lawyers will adopt anything like this until, like spell check, it’s completely integrated with word processing or a contract assembly tool.