Draft for attorney review. Not yet in effect.
1. About these terms
These Terms of Use ("Terms") govern your use of the Sidebar Legal website and platform (the "Platform"), operated by Sidebar Legal, LLC, a Missouri limited liability company ("Sidebar Legal," "we," "us," or "our").
By using the Platform or creating an account, you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you use the Platform for a business or other organization, you confirm that you have authority to agree to these Terms on its behalf, and "you" includes that organization.
If you don't agree, please don't use the Platform.
2. Legal services and the engagement letter
The Platform is how we deliver legal services, but using it does not by itself make us your lawyers. An attorney-client relationship begins only when we accept your matter and you accept our engagement letter.
Our legal services are governed by the engagement letter and its Standard Terms of Engagement. If anything in these Terms conflicts with the engagement letter, the engagement letter controls.
Information on the public website, including service descriptions, sample redlines and answers to frequently asked questions, is general information, not legal advice for your situation. Don't act on it without advice from a lawyer who knows your facts.
Before you describe your matter in detail, we ask for the names of the other people or businesses involved so we can check for conflicts of interest. We treat what you tell us as confidential from your first message, even if we don't end up representing you, as the rules of professional conduct require.
3. Your account
You must be at least 18 years old and able to form a binding contract to create an account.
We sign you in with links sent to your email address. Keep access to that email account secure: anyone who can open a sign-in link can access your account. Tell us promptly at [privacy@sidebarlegal.ai] if you think someone has accessed your account without permission.
Give us accurate information, including your name, your organization and the other parties to your matter, and keep it up to date. Accurate party names are essential to our conflict check.
4. Your documents and information
You keep ownership of the documents, messages and other information you provide ("Your Content").
You give us permission to store, copy, process and display Your Content as needed to run the Platform, check for conflicts, provide legal services, keep the records the law and professional rules require, and protect the security of the Platform. This includes processing by the service providers described in our Privacy Policy.
Only upload content you have the right to share with us. If a document is subject to a confidentiality agreement with someone else, it's your responsibility to decide whether sharing it with your lawyers is permitted.
5. How we use AI
The Platform uses artificial intelligence to help with tasks such as gathering intake information, summarizing your matter and preparing a first-pass review of documents.
AI output is a tool for our attorneys, not legal advice to you. An attorney reviews and decides on every change and every piece of advice we deliver. Unreviewed AI suggestions are not shown to clients.
The intake assistant asks questions to gather facts. It does not give legal advice, and its questions or summaries are not a lawyer's opinion about your situation.
We use AI providers under commercial terms that do not permit them to use your information to train their models. Our Privacy Policy explains how these providers handle data.
6. Fees and payments
Prices are shown before you submit a matter. The engagement letter sets the terms for fees, including when we place a hold on your card and when we collect the fee.
Payments are processed by Stripe. Your card details go directly to Stripe and are not stored on our servers. Stripe's own terms and privacy policy apply to its processing.
7. Acceptable use
Please don't:
- use the Platform for anything unlawful, fraudulent or harmful to others;
- upload malware, or content you have no right to share;
- try to access another person's account, matters or documents, or any part of the Platform you're not authorized to use;
- probe, scan or test the Platform's security, or interfere with its operation, except with our written permission;
- copy, scrape or resell the Platform or its content, or use it to build a competing service;
- try to make the Platform's AI features produce content that is unlawful or that ignores their limits;
- give us false information about yourself, your organization or the parties to your matter.
We may suspend or close an account that breaks these rules, subject to our professional obligations to any client we represent.
8. Our platform
The Platform, its software, design, text and branding belong to Sidebar Legal, LLC or its licensors. These Terms give you a limited, personal, non-transferable right to use the Platform for its intended purpose while your account is in good standing.
Work product we deliver to you as your lawyers, such as marked-up documents and drafts, is governed by the engagement letter.
If you send us feedback or suggestions about the Platform, we may use them without obligation to you.
9. Third-party services
The Platform relies on third-party providers, such as hosting, database, email, payment and AI providers. We choose them carefully, but we don't control them and aren't responsible for their separate terms or websites. Links to other websites are for convenience only.
10. Disclaimers
We work to keep the Platform available and secure, but we provide the website and software features "as is" and "as available," and we can't promise they will always be uninterrupted or error-free. To the extent the law allows, we disclaim implied warranties for the Platform's software features, such as warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement.
This section concerns the website and software only. It does not limit the professional duties our attorneys owe you when we represent you.
11. Limits on liability
To the extent the law allows, Sidebar Legal, LLC will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages arising from your use of the Platform's website and software features, and our total liability for such claims will not exceed the greater of $100 or the fees you paid us in the 12 months before the claim.
Nothing in these Terms limits our liability for our legal services or for professional malpractice, or any liability that cannot be limited under the law or the rules of professional conduct. Claims about our legal services are governed by the engagement letter.
12. Your responsibility for misuse
If you misuse the Platform or upload content you had no right to share, and a third party brings a claim against us as a result, you agree to cover our reasonable losses and costs from that claim, to the extent the law allows.
13. Ending your use
You may stop using the Platform at any time. Closing your account doesn't end any engagement you have with us; the engagement letter explains how an engagement ends.
We may suspend or end access to the Platform for violations of these Terms or to protect the Platform or others. Sections that by their nature should survive, such as ownership, disclaimers, limits on liability and governing law, continue after access ends. We keep client files as the rules of professional conduct require, as described in our Privacy Policy.
14. Governing law and disputes
These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Missouri, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules.
Disputes about our legal services are resolved as the engagement letter provides. Any other dispute about these Terms or the Platform will be resolved in the state or federal courts located in [County], Missouri, and you and we consent to their jurisdiction.
15. Changes to these terms
We may update these Terms. We'll change the effective date above, and for material changes we'll give notice through the Platform or by email before they take effect. Continuing to use the Platform after changes take effect means you accept them.
16. Contact
Sidebar Legal, LLC, [Office address]. Email: [privacy@sidebarlegal.ai].
Electronic notices: you agree that we may send notices about the Platform electronically, including by email and through the Platform.