Non-reserved business legal services
There is no number on this page, and you should be wary of anyone who puts one on theirs. You get a scope, a fee and an expected timescale for your document, in writing, before the work starts.
A customer has sent their contract over and wants it signed by Friday. The honest answer to “how fast?” is that we will not put a number on a web page, because that number would be a guess about a document nobody has read yet. What you get instead is a scope, a fixed fee and an expected timescale for your document, confirmed in writing before the work starts — so you know where you stand before you commit to anything.
A contract review starts at £249 +VAT. At the £200 to £350 +VAT an hour commonly quoted for this work, the same money buys you roughly 45 minutes to an hour and a quarter of a solicitor's time.
Because a ten-page supply agreement and a sixty-page framework agreement with five schedules are not the same job, and a published turnaround would have to be either useless or untrue. Anyone advertising a flat “48-hour review” for a contract they have not seen is quoting a marketing figure, not an estimate.
The useful version is a timescale for the actual document, given once someone has looked at it. Send it over and you get that before you have spent anything.
What it is not is a rubber stamp. If the schedules have not been read, the review has not been done.
A made-up scenario, to show what changes the work rather than a promise about yours. A consultancy receives a client contract at 3pm on a Friday. Version one: it forwards the PDF alone, says “can you look at this”, and mentions no deadline. The first job is chasing the two schedules the contract refers to and asking what the deal is worth. Version two: it sends the contract with its schedules, says the client wants signature by the 14th, names the payment terms and the liability cap as its worries, and answers questions the same afternoon. Same document, same fee, and only one of them is waiting on information.
Say so in the first line, not the last paragraph. Where a deadline is tight there is usually a middle option: a first read that flags the two or three clauses you must not sign as they stand, with the full review behind it. That is often the right answer when a customer is pushing for signature.
What will not happen is a document coming back with a tick against it when nobody has read the schedules. If a deadline cannot be met properly you get told, rather than handed something half-checked. And a deadline you agreed to is rarely a reason to sign something unchecked — it is usually more moveable than it feels.
The more common problem runs the other way. Most contracts arrive with the deadline already burning because they sat in an inbox for a fortnight before anyone opened them. Send it the day it lands and the question largely disappears.
Two things take a document out of our hands, and you are told at the scoping stage before you have committed to anything: the work is reserved, or the matter is already contentious — the other side has instructed solicitors, threatened a claim or issued proceedings. It then goes to RHF Solicitors (SRA no. 324115) at rates agreed before that work starts, with anything already done going across rather than being repeated. Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the SRA.
Send the contract, with its schedules, to book a legal review, and say in the first line what the deadline is and what you are worried about. You will get the scope, the fee and the timescale back before anything starts.
If contracts land on you regularly, the sums change: Business Legal at £249 +VAT a month covers typically four to six matters a month including up to three contract reviews of around 20 pages each, with negotiation guidance — roughly what one ad-hoc review costs. This is general legal information, not advice on your document.
For what a review actually looks at, read our guide to business contracts. For how this compares with a template site, an online platform or a high street firm, read Buzz Legal vs the alternatives. Prices are on fixed-fee work.
This is general legal information, not advice on your situation. For advice tailored to your business, book a legal review. Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the SRA; it provides non-reserved business legal support, and reserved legal activities are carried out by RHF Solicitors, authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (no. 324115).
Leave your email and we'll send the pre-signature checklist — the eight clauses worth reading before you agree to anything, and what a fair version of each looks like.
You get an expected timescale for your own document, in writing, before the work starts — not a number published on a web page, because that would be a guess about a contract nobody has read. Two things move it in your favour: sending the actual document with its schedules rather than describing it, and stating the real deadline rather than a padded one. What comes back is a marked-up copy, a written summary separating what is standard from what carries risk, the clauses worth arguing about and what a fair version looks like, and one follow-up exchange. A contract review starts at £249 +VAT.
Four things, in rough order of frequency. Waiting on you: a review generates questions about how your business works, and answering them in one reply rather than over four days is the biggest factor you control. Complexity — a sixty-page framework agreement with schedules is not a ten-page supplier contract. A deal that keeps changing, so the document we read is not the document being signed. And an active negotiation, where part of the pace belongs to the other side. None of these are sprung on you later; the expected timescale goes to you in writing before anything starts.
Four things, all within your control. Send the complete document, including schedules, annexes and anything it references, because reviewing a contract without its schedules is reviewing half of it. State the real deadline and what happens at it. Say what the deal is worth commercially and what you are actually worried about, since a liability clause that is fine on a one-off supply is not fine on your largest customer. And answer the follow-up questions in one reply rather than across a three-day thread. If it is genuinely urgent, say so in the first line rather than the last paragraph.
No. The detail is the product, and a document returned with a tick against it when nobody has read the schedules is worth nothing. Where a deadline is tight there is usually a middle option: a first read flagging the two or three clauses you must not sign as they stand, with the full review behind it. That is often the right answer when a customer is pushing for signature. If a deadline cannot be met properly you get told, rather than handed something half-checked. A deadline you agreed to is rarely a reason to sign something unchecked, and it is usually more moveable than it feels.
You are told as soon as it is spotted, usually at the scoping stage before you have committed to anything. Two things trigger it: the work is reserved by law, or the matter is already contentious — the other side has instructed solicitors, threatened a claim, or issued proceedings. It then goes to RHF Solicitors (SRA no. 324115) at rates agreed before that work starts, with anything already done going across rather than being repeated. If what looks like a contract review is really a dispute, you hear that on day one instead of paying for a review that is not the help you need.
Clear scope · fixed fees available. Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the SRA.