Legal Design Mark

The Legal Design Mark provides a certification standard for the transparency and accessibility levels in legal documents.

Organisations that wish to provide users of their contracts and policies with an engaging and user-friendly experience will be able to display the Legal Design Mark as a badge of trust and confidence.

Contact us for a free Legal Design Mark pre-grading call by clicking below!

What is the Legal Design Mark?

Organisations can submit legal documents to Visual Legals for certification against an objective standard and they will be awarded with the Legal Design Mark for that specific document if it meets the relevant criteria.

The Legal Design Mark enables users of legal document to quickly verify the levels of transparency and accessibility in a legal document - it is a badge for your organisation to proudly display to your customers, partners and suppliers that you care about the clarity and accessibility of your contracts.

How are legal documents graded?

We benchmark legal documents on a grading scale, so a document may be awarded the standard Legal Design Mark or be Silver Certified, Gold Certified or Platinum Certified.

Essentially, the more Legal Design elements that are included in the document; the higher the grade that will be awarded.

Examples of Legal Design elements could be:

  • Clause summaries - providing an overview of key clauses in a non-misleading manner;

  • Plain English legal text - bespoke text which is tailored to the intended audience;

  • Infographics / clause illustrations - linked to document provisions which enhance understanding / show a process;

  • Details of the commercial context to explain certain clauses;

  • Details of the estimated read-time; and

  • much more!

There is huge amounts of innovation in the Legal Design space and our Grading Team keep apprised of the latest developments and build these into the grading scale.

Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet

We offer Legal Design Mark assessments and the Legal Design Mark Summary Sheets for a fixed fee of £495 plus VAT* and this includes: 

  • Legal Design Mark grading; 

  • The creation and population of a Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet; 

  • Certification that the summaries are representative of the document by a regulated Law Firm 

  • Calculation of the full document estimated read time; 

  • Calculation of the Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet estimated read time. 

  • Creation of a branded and designed Front Cover for the relevant document (if you do not already have one - the Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet is intended to be placed at page 2 of the document). 

*The fee may increase depending on the size, complexity and length of a contract. 

For an additional £495 plus VAT, we can customise the layout of the Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet to be tailored to your branding. This will incorporate the Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet in a consistent and unified manner to tie in with the rest of the document. 

The Legal Design Mark Summary Sheet is the cornerstone of building transparency with your customers, partners and suppliers. It provides a summary of the key provisions that are typically the most important in legal documents.  

We have multiple forms of Summary Sheets – from Commercial Contracts to Privacy Notices and everything in between.  

 This approach has clear benefits: 

  • Increased transparency with your customers; 

  • Reduced need for expensive and time-consuming legal reviews; 

  • Faster contract completion process; and 

  • Cohesive user experience, clarity, accessibility and positive engagement. 

Legal Design Mark FAQs

Can you obtain a Legal Design Mark if a contract has already been created by another Law Firm?

Yes of course – we can certify any third party document. 

How can I upgrade the Legal Design Mark to Silver Certified, Gold Certified or Platinum Certified?

Your document will need to meet our strict grading criteria and contain a combination of Legal Design elements to provide an engaging and user-friendly experience for users.  

Do you guarantee that we will achieve the Legal Design Mark if we use Visual Legals for creating a Legally Designed contract?

Yes - if you engage Visual Legals for a Legal Design project, we can tailor the scope of the project to guarantee that your legal document will achieve a Legal Design Mark grading. The grade of the Legal Design Mark comes down to the project specification and your budget, but we can fulfil the project in-line with the Legal Design Mark grading requirements. 

If I pay for an existing contract to be graded, am I guaranteed to obtain the Legal Design Mark?

No – the document would need to meet the grading criteria. If an application for Legal Design Mark grading fails, no refunds will be provided. We recommend that you book a pre-grading call with us in advance to talk through the process in detail to ensure that your legal document has the best chance possible of being awarded the Legal Design Mark.