The Trainee's Draft and the Partner's Signature
You are a partner in a three-lawyer firm. A trainee has drafted a statement of claim in a contract dispute worth €95,000. The trainee used a template from an old file, left in the name of a different plaintiff in two places, cited a repealed article, and claimed interest from a date before the invoice was due. The trainee has already emailed the draft to the client for approval and told the client it is 'ready to file'. The limitation period expires in nine days. You have two hours before court closes and a meeting with another client. The trainee is in his third month and has not been supervised on drafting before.
1. Identify the errors and their consequences, and set out your immediate priorities.
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The errors are: wrong party names, which could lead to a defective claim or confusion about the claimant; a repealed article, which undermines the legal basis and invites a prompt defence; and interest claimed from the wrong date, which overstates the claim and damages credibility. The email to the client compounds the problem because the client believes the document is ready. Priorities: correct the party names and the legal basis first, because those go to the claim's validity; fix the interest date; then check the limitation date and whether filing a protective claim is possible. Two hours is enough to correct a short statement if you focus. Do not let the other meeting displace this; a nine-day limitation period with a defective draft is a real risk of malpractice. If time runs short, consider filing a concise corrected claim and supplementing later where procedure allows.
2. How do you handle the client communication and the trainee's supervision failure?
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Contact the client before the draft goes anywhere: explain that the version sent was a working draft, that you have found errors, and that a corrected version will follow. Apologise plainly without blaming the trainee to the client, and do not overstate certainty about the filing date. With the trainee, address the conduct directly but proportionately: the template reuse, the failure to check the article, and above all the email telling the client it was ready without supervision. Explain why each mattered. Set a rule that no draft leaves the firm without a supervising lawyer's review, and put a simple checklist in place. Record the incident and the remedial steps. This is a supervision failure by the firm as much as by the trainee, so review how the work was assigned and whether the trainee had enough guidance.
3. Draft a short internal checklist (four to six items) for outgoing drafts, and explain how each item addresses a failure in this file.
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- Party check: confirm every name, registration number and address against the engagement letter. Addresses the wrong-plaintiff error. 2. Authority check: verify each cited article is in force on the filing date and applies to the facts. Addresses the repealed article. 3. Arithmetic and dates: recalculate interest, due dates and limitation. Addresses the premature interest claim. 4. Client-communication gate: no 'ready to file' message without a supervising lawyer's sign-off. Addresses the premature email. 5. Template hygiene: strip all prior matter details and search for placeholders before saving. Addresses the recycled template. 6. Second-reader rule: a lawyer other than the drafter reviews before filing. Addresses the absence of supervision. Keep the checklist to one page and attach it to every draft file so it is used, not filed away.