As of 13 August 2026, AI cannot check whether a UK business contract is legally binding.

What to actually do

1. Hand it to a person

   The route this page recommends

   Someone with a licence or accountable authority has to sign this before it counts.

2. Use a tool built for this

   Second choice

3. Do it yourself

   The distant third

   A chat interface gets you a draft, but you cannot verify it yourself. That is the catch.

   How to actually do it

   1. Open the complete contract, including schedules, referenced terms, signature pages and any documents incorporated by reference.
   2. Gather the negotiation emails, messages, draft versions, signed copies, evidence of signatory authority, invoices, payments and records of work already performed.
   3. Write down the parties, business purpose, signing dates, disputed points, deadlines and what each party has done since signing.
   4. Paste the contract and the factual context into a chatbot with the prompt above, asking it to quote the exact clauses rather than relying on a summary.
   5. Check each quoted passage against the original contract and mark every statement that depends on an email, conversation, payment or other evidence outside the contract.
   6. Send the contract, evidence pack, AI issue list and unanswered factual questions to a UK solicitor, asking whether the business can rely on the agreement and what action is safe.

   Prompt

   Review the UK business contract below as a preliminary issue-spotting exercise, not as a legal conclusion. Do not say that it is legally binding or unenforceable. Instead:
   
   1. Summarise the apparent parties, purpose, key obligations, payment terms, duration, termination rights, governing law and dispute terms.
   2. Identify the clauses and missing facts that could affect formation or enforceability, including offer and acceptance, consideration, certainty, authority to sign, conditions precedent, execution, variation, incorporation of other terms, misrepresentation, illegality, capacity and agency where relevant.
   3. For each issue, quote the relevant wording, explain why it matters under general UK contract principles, state what fact is missing, and label the point as high, medium or low priority for a solicitor to check. Do not invent facts, cases, legislation or legal conclusions.
   4. Separate issues visible from the contract from issues that require evidence outside it, such as emails, negotiations, performance, signatures, authority and communications.
   5. Produce a short list of documents and factual answers I should give a UK solicitor.
   6. End with a plain statement that this is not professional advice and that a solicitor should decide whether the business can rely on the contract.
   
   Contract:
   [PASTE THE FULL CONTRACT HERE]
   
   Business context:
   - Parties and their roles: [INSERT]
   - What was agreed before signing: [INSERT]
   - Who negotiated and signed, and their authority: [INSERT]
   - What each party has done since signing: [INSERT]
   - Any dispute, deadline or proposed action: [INSERT]

   Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.