When creating legal guidelines for your business, avoid legal language, a form of drafting that makes your policies unnecessarily complicated. This article discusses the importance of legal language, reasons to avoid legal language, and best drafting practices for your legal policies. Use plain language instead of legal language to make users happy and attract more customers. A person may want to unlock their phone, but can`t because they haven`t paid their bill. It is included in the Terms and Conditions, but the customer may have skimmed these Terms and Conditions only because he thinks they are too complicated or do not apply. In this case, the legal language protects the company, but if the legal language is not explained or the customer does not read the contract in its entirety, the customer may feel mistreated. I realize that this statement is written in the harmless legalese that judges must use, but I am sure that Justice Gallagher is showing his true feelings here. Translated from legal German into plain English, this sentence simply refers to the line “Date”, which often follows a signature. Legal language in legal documents eliminates the possibility of misinterpretation of words or phrases. In normal language, a goal can be processed in one sentence to allow for simplified understanding. In the legal profession, the same purpose could be described in several paragraphs, as it could have different meanings for different people, which could lead to unintended consequences. Legal language refers informally to the specialized terminology and expressions used by people in the legal field and in legal documents. Legal language is notoriously difficult for the public to understand.

The most important features of classical legal language include long, verbose and complicated sentence structures with passive and outdated formalisms, as well as the use of Latin, archaic or unnecessarily long words when a simpler and clearer language exists. Your policies are also for your protection. For example, terms and conditions help protect your website`s rights and determine how users can interact with your properties. If your terms and conditions are full of legal language, your users won`t understand them and won`t be able to follow your rules. See the full definition of legal language in the dictionary of English language learners Let`s say you sign a contract to become a professional basketball player. The contract contains many confusing terms that you are not sure about. Before you decide to sign, hire a lawyer to review the contract with you. It tells you that the legal language of a contract is sometimes too difficult for the typical person to understand. Therefore, it is important that the contract is first reviewed by a lawyer. Here are three main reasons why you should avoid legal language when creating your legal and business policies. Also, legal language makes users feel alienated, as most people outside of the lawyer are not familiar with legalese.

Words and phrases can have different meanings for different people. Someone who lives in the city might say, “I`m going to the city.” Anyone who lives in the area knows you want to go to the supermarket a mile away. However, a stranger could be confused by this clue. In the legal profession, this type of misinterpretation can have negative consequences. Write an essay of about two to three paragraphs that defines legal language as it should do and how it differs from normal language. The examples above show that it is possible to replace legal language with plain language in your policies. TurboTax`s current user agreement, which still contains an arbitration clause, covers over 15,000 words of dense legal language. The term “review” is legal language – but an important legal language because it describes exactly how a court should review a law. When customers see legal language in your business policies, they may feel confused, offended, or simply reluctant to engage with your business.

All of these feelings make customers less inclined to make a purchase or sign up for membership. For us, the worst culprits are legal language and planning documents. Here`s another legal example found in an example disclaimer: Most of the time, the political conversation is in legal language about free speech and speech matters, but we need to change and understand the true cost of misinformation. These sample sentences are automatically selected from various online information sources to reflect the current use of the word “legal language.” The views expressed in the examples do not represent the views of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us your feedback. Legal writing courses in law schools increasingly emphasize the benefits of legal writing, which can be understood clearly, concisely, and by non-legal readers. Proponents of plain English argue that since non-lawyers have adjusted their legal rights, duties and obligations through legal instruments, parties should be able to understand the content of the instrument without having to bear the additional costs of hiring a lawyer to translate the legal language. Legal language is used by companies in the hope that it will make their policies more legally sound. However, since few users are familiar with legal language, too much of it in your legal policies will likely hurt your business. Now that you are more aware of these legal terms, you should know better what you see the next time you look at a legal form.