The check-sheet: pre-filing verification in three reads

Every filing ends the same way: somebody reads. Before the paperbook goes anywhere, each annexure has to be held against the pleading and the two made to agree — the date the draft pleads against the date on the document, the parties named against the parties on the face, the faint page caught before a registry catches it. That read-through is counsel's, and nothing replaces it. But it can arrive shortened, with the doubtful lines already marked. That is what the check-sheet is for.

What the check-sheet is

A verification check-sheet comes back with every paperbook AIC builds — one document, one line per annexure. While AIC matches your files to your draft — reading the draft, identifying each badly-named file against the annexure you pleaded, renaming it to your exact title, setting it in your sequence — it verifies as it goes. Whatever sits cleanly against the draft is marked OK. Whatever diverges is marked CONFIRM, with the divergence stated and the page cited.

The divergences are small and the stakes are not. Two emails can share a date when only one belongs at P-9; a letter dated the 5th can sit behind a paragraph that pleads the 8th. Caught at AIC's desk, that is one line awaiting your confirmation. Caught at the registry's counter, it is an objection with a deadline in the way.

Manual assembly, however careful, leaves no such record behind. This one is in writing.

Read one — your draft

The draft is the standard, and it is read first. A settled draft already carries the whole architecture of the filing: the annexure sequence, and the exact title pleaded for each document. That part is the lawyering, and it stays yours. AIC takes the titles and the order as given and reproduces them exactly — never rephrased, never re-sequenced. Everything that follows is measured against this one text.

Read two — the face of every file

As each file in the folder is matched, AIC reads what is on its face and sets it against what the draft pleads:

• The date — read off the document and put beside the date your draft pleads for it.
• The parties — the names on the face confirmed against the names pleaded, flagged the moment they diverge.
• Legibility — anything faint, cropped or part-scanned is flagged for a human eye. We flag; we never guess.

A clean line reads like a clean line. A flag carries the whole picture:

C-7    CONFIRM   draft says 14.03.2021 —
                 face shows 14.03.2020 (p. 212)
C-18   CONFIRM   scanned drawing —
                 confirm legibility by eye

Which of the two dates is right is not AIC's question. Perhaps the draft carries a slip; perhaps the wrong letter sits in the folder. Deciding is counsel's work, and nothing in the draft or the document is touched while you decide. We flag; we never edit.

Read three — yours

The check-sheet changes how the final read begins. Instead of ninety annexures read cold at midnight, you open one sheet: the CONFIRM lines first, each with its page reference, then the rest with the summary in hand — 74 OK, 16 for your confirmation, and you know exactly which sixteen.

The mandatory read-through gets shorter; it never disappears. Certification stays counsel's act, and the filing call stays where it belongs — with you. The check-sheet takes no view on which documents matter, offers no advice, computes no limitation. The clerk, not counsel.

Files are read-only, processed on our own machines, deleted on completion.

The check-sheet: questions litigators ask

Does the check-sheet mean I can skip my final read?

No, and it is not built to. It shortens the mandatory read-through by marking where to look first; the read itself, and certification, remain counsel's.

What exactly is checked — and what is not?

Checked: each annexure's date, parties and legibility, against your draft. Not checked: merits, relevance, which documents to file, limitation. Those are lawyering, and they stay yours.

If AIC finds a mismatch, is anything corrected?

Never. A CONFIRM line states what the draft says and what the face shows, with the page where it sits. Nothing in the draft or the document is altered. We flag; we never edit.

Does the check-sheet come with every job?

With every paperbook, every time. It is produced during the matching itself, not bolted on afterwards.