AI Contract Review for Architecture and Engineering Firms
Every client agreement, reviewed to your firm’s standards.
Your firm’s positions on liability, insurance and commercial terms, applied to every client agreement, at speed and at scale, without a lawyer on every contract.
ReviewPro applies your firm’s positions to every client agreement and returns it redlined, with each change explained in plain language.
Your project managers run the review and act on the result. Principals and risk managers see only the exceptions. Routine agreements stop going to outside counsel for a first read.
LegalSifter ReviewPro
Read and redline every client agreement to your standards
ReviewPro reads a client’s agreement against your playbook and returns a fully redlined document in Microsoft Word. Every edit includes a plain-English rationale. Comments to the counterparty are optional.
ReviewPro completes a first pass in minutes, for up to a 90% reduction in overall review time.
Your reviewer accepts, modifies or rejects each edit. The firm decides what it signs.
Architecture & Engineering · Pre-signature review
The Design Firm’s Contract Checklist
These are the 18 terms that decide what your firm is liable for and what it gets paid. Each one gives the position to hold and the language to watch for. The Architecture and Engineering Professional Services Agreement playbook applies all of them, on every agreement ReviewPro reviews.
What you are liable for
Standard of care
The ordinary skill and care of a competent professional under similar circumstances.
Watch for: “Highest,” “best,” “free from defects,” or any warranty or guarantee of results.
Duty to defend
Each party funds its own defense; no duty to defend the client.
Watch for: A standalone defense obligation that triggers on an allegation, before any finding of fault.
Indemnity
Limited to the extent of your own negligence.
Watch for: Broad-form “arising out of or relating to,” and a long list of extra indemnified parties.
Limitation of liability
A cap tied to your fee or insurance, with a mutual waiver of consequential damages.
Watch for: No cap at all, or carve-outs that quietly swallow the one you negotiated.
Certifications
A professional opinion, to the best of your knowledge, within your scope of work.
Watch for: “Certify and guarantee/warrant,” or certifying beyond the work you performed.
Opinion of probable cost
An estimate based on professional judgment.
Watch for: Language that treats the number as a guaranteed maximum or grounds to withhold fees.
Betterment
You pay only the added cost of correcting an error, not what the owner would have spent anyway.
Watch for: Liability for the entire cost to fix, including the value the owner gains from the correction.
Getting paid and keeping your work
Payment
Defined due dates, interest on late payment, and a right to suspend for non-payment.
Watch for: Pay-if-paid, broad withholding rights, and no interest on overdue amounts.
Instruments of service
You keep ownership; the client gets a license for this project on full payment.
Watch for: Outright assignment, “work made for hire,” or unrestricted reuse on other projects.
Scope and additional services
A written way to authorize and price extra work before you perform it.
Watch for: Open-ended “as directed” duties, or added services with no fee adjustment.
Time and liquidated damages
Perform with reasonable professional diligence.
Watch for: “Time is of the essence” and liquidated damages, which a typical professional liability policy will not cover.
Suspension and termination
Payment for services through termination, including wind-down, and notice before convenience termination.
Watch for: Termination for convenience with no pay for work in progress or demobilization.
Insurance and the long tail
Insurance limits
Professional liability at limits you carry, stated per claim and in the aggregate.
Watch for: Required limits above your policy, or project-specific coverage you must buy.
Additional insured and subrogation
Additional-insured status on general liability and auto only.
Watch for: Additional insured on your professional liability policy, or a waiver of subrogation on it.
Limitation period
Claims limited to the shorter of a set period from substantial completion or the statute.
Watch for: An open-ended window that revives claims long after the project closed.
No individual liability
Recovery runs against the firm, not its principals or employees.
Watch for: Personal guarantees, or claims against individual licensed professionals.
Site and hazardous conditions
Reliance on owner-supplied information; undisclosed conditions stay the owner’s risk.
Watch for: Accepting responsibility for pre-existing or hazardous conditions you did not create.
Dispute resolution and venue
Negotiation or mediation first, a defined governing law and forum, and each party bearing its own fees.
Watch for: A distant mandatory forum, one-sided fee-shifting, or the client alone deciding fault.
The playbook also applies the commercial positions every services agreement turns on, including assignment and change of control, subcontracting, audit rights, most-favored-customer language and non-solicitation. Playbook Customization configures your own positions, including ones that vary by State.
ReviewPro is not legal or insurance advice. Confirm your positions with counsel and your broker.
What changes for your firm
Catch the terms your insurance may not cover
Professional liability insurance covers your firm for negligence. It generally does not cover a promise you would not otherwise have owed. A warranty, a guarantee that the work will be free from defects, or an agreement to pay a client’s legal costs are obligations of that kind.
ReviewPro flags them on every agreement, along with an elevated standard of care, a duty to defend, broad-form indemnity and liquidated damages.
Identify and protect critical commercial terms
The playbook works the commercial half of the agreement as hard as the legal half. It checks net-30 payment from invoice, interest on late payment, a defined process for disputed invoices, a suspension right if the client stops paying, most-favored-customer language, and protection for opinions of probable cost.
Review in minutes instead of hours
ReviewPro completes a first pass in minutes, for up to a 90% reduction in overall review time.
Apply the same standards firmwide
Every agreement is reviewed against the positions your firm has agreed. When a task order arrives years after the master agreement that governs it, the master’s terms are applied.
Send less routine paper to outside counsel
Routine agreements stop going out for a first read. Your counsel spends those hours on the exceptions.
Contract review cost estimate
What contract review costs you today
Enter your own numbers. The fields start with example values, not industry figures, so replace each one with your firm’s own numbers.
Your numbers
Reviews handled by your own team, and the ones you send out.
Your estimate
Estimated Annual Savings with ReviewPro
$45,989and 534 hours returned to your team
This is an estimate built from the numbers you entered, not a quote or a guarantee. It shows what review costs before and after, and does not subtract the cost of a ReviewPro subscription. The up to 90% reduction in overall review time is a LegalSifter figure. Every other number here is yours.
Agreements you cannot redline
Federal work, state transportation agency work and design-builder subconsultant agreements often arrive on terms the client will not change.
ReviewPro still shows you which of your positions the agreement departs from. You price that risk into the fee and brief the project team on what the firm has accepted.
Proven on design firm agreements since 2019
Our contract review technology powers a white-labeled contract review benefit offered by an insurance partner serving the architecture and engineering market. More than 6,600 design firm agreements have been reviewed on the platform since 2019.
- 100+ standard playbooks
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Frequently asked questions
What should an architecture or engineering firm look for in a client’s professional services agreement?
Read the terms that decide liability first: the standard of care, any duty to defend, the indemnity, and the limitation of liability. Then read the terms that decide payment: due dates, withholding rights, and whether you can suspend for non-payment. The checklist on this page covers all 18 terms with the position to hold and the language to watch for on each.
Which contract terms does professional liability insurance not cover?
Professional liability insurance covers your firm for negligence, meaning work that fell short of the professional standard. It generally does not cover an obligation you agreed to in a contract that you would not have owed otherwise. Common examples are an elevated standard of care such as “highest” or “best,” an express warranty or guarantee, an agreement to defend the client, and liquidated damages. Policy forms differ, so confirm your own with your broker.
How would I know if a client raised the standard of care?
It is rarely obvious. The clause headed “Standard of Care” often reads correctly while warranty or guarantee language elsewhere in the agreement raises it. Look for “highest,” “best,” “first-class,” “free from defects,” “fitness for purpose,” and any use of “warrant” or “guarantee” applied to your services. ReviewPro checks the whole agreement and edits the language back to the ordinary professional standard in place.
Who should review contracts at a design firm with no in-house counsel?
In practice a project manager reads the agreement first, because they own the project and the client relationship. That works when they know what to escalate. ReviewPro gives them a complete first pass with every edit explained. They handle the routine terms and send the exceptions to whoever decides, whether that is a principal, a risk manager, or outside counsel.
Our insurance carrier reviews contracts for free. What does this add?
Carrier and broker reviews are useful and most firms should keep using them. They are also narrower than the phrase suggests, and the carriers say so themselves. One insurer’s own loss prevention specialist writes that a broker and carrier “should only serve in a limited capacity to answer specific insurance questions.” Fee, scope, schedule, intellectual property, termination and data terms fall outside that review. It gives advice rather than redlines, and it leaves no record of what you accepted.
Can this help on government and agency agreements we cannot negotiate?
Yes, though the value is different. Federal, state transportation agency, and design-builder subconsultant agreements often arrive on terms the client will not change. The review still tells you which of your positions the agreement departs from before you sign. You price that risk into the fee and brief the project team on what the firm has accepted.
Do we have to build our own playbook before we get value?
No. The architecture and engineering playbook ships with proven positions and works on day one. Playbook Customization exists for firms that want their own positions, fallback language and state-specific variations written in.
Can our project managers use it without legal training?
Yes. The playbook holds the positions your firm has decided, and the reviewer accepts, modifies or rejects each suggested edit rather than drafting anything. Every edit includes a plain-English explanation of why it was made.
How does this fit with the project management or accounting system we already run?
It complements them. Your project and accounting systems track the project, the budget and the invoices. ReviewPro works on the agreement before it is signed, and Contract Logix keeps the signed agreement and its obligations findable afterward.
How long does it take to get started?
Under 20 minutes from signup to a first redline. Create an account, install the Microsoft Word or Google Docs add-in, choose the architecture and engineering playbook, and review a contract.