Contract deviation analysis uses AI to highlight contracts that deviate, and by how much, from your standard contract templates.
Deviation score
A Deviation score is assigned that indicates how similar a revised contract is to the originating template. A score of 0 would mean that the file is entirely different from the template and a score of 1 would indicate that the file is nearly identical (or possibly identical).
You can use this score to decide if a contract should be reviewed in more detail. The final comparison can be viewed using the native HighQ comparison tool (in document viewer), or a comparison tool configured on your instance, such as Workshare Compare. If further analysis is required, scores for every analysed contract can be added to an iSheet for further comparison and investigation.
Contracts and templates must be in Word, PDF or TXT format. However Workshare Compare must be enabled on your instance to preview a comparison with a PDF or TXT document.
If a Word document is compared to a PDF, then the deviation score may be lower than expected (i.e. more changes) as differences in the underlying file formats may be included as changes to the text.
Options - Ignore entities and values
You may adjust settings so that some party names, dates and values are excluded when calculating Contract Deviation. Ignoring these entities will improve the accuracy of identifying relevant changes in a contract when compared to a template, because we expect these entities to change.
A Site Admin can choose to ignore entities when performing a Contract Deviation - this can exclude All entities (names, dates, and number values), to Include values (but ignore names and dates), or to Include all entities (i.e. no exclusions) when calculating the deviation.
Open Admin and then select Configure under AI Hub.
In the HighQ section, select the More actions icon, then Contract deviation.
Click the drop-down field under Deviation options and select an option:
- Ignore all entities - ignore differences or changes in party names, dates, and certain values (such as the consideration amount)
- Include values - include values in deviation calculations (but ignore names and dates)
- Include all entities - include all text when calculating the deviation
Click Apply to save your option.
Using Ignore all entities or Include values can increase the accuracy of deviation calculations by ignoring changes to items that frequently change (such as party names, dates and values).
Performing the comparison
Contracts stored in the Files module may be compared with your standard contract templates. Open the folder that contains the contracts:
Assign a template
The contract will be compared to a contract template, so first check that the contract has an assigned contract template.
Select the file or files to compare, then click Action, Assign AI then Assign contract template.
You may select more than one file and assign them to the same contract template.
In the Select template panel, select the correct contract template.
Click Save and analyse to assign the template and return to the folder view.
You may select a template on a different site, but the comparison can be viewed only if the contract and template are on the same site.
View contract deviation results
Click More actions for the analysed contract, then Contract deviation.
The Contract deviation window opens:
- Template - the template used for comparison, click the red x to remove the template
- Deviation score - this indicates haw similar the document is to the template. 1.00 indicates that the document is near-identical
- Select template - click Browse to assign a new template to the contract. This will reset the Deviation score
- Contract comparison - click Preview to view the compared contract with differences highlighted and labelled (see below)
The Preview button is disabled if file comparison tools are not enabled on your HighQ instance. Please contact the HighQ support team to enable this feature.
- Clause insight - click Export to download a clause-by-clause listing of the comparison with deviation scores in xls format (see below)
Example Contract comparison in Document viewer:
The comparison can be viewed only if the contract and template are on the same site.
If Workshare Compare is enabled on your instance, the comparison will be previewed by the Workshare Compare viewer, not the HighQ document viewer.
Example Clause insight file in Excel:
The analysis is made by examining clauses. When using the HighQ AI, clauses will be identified as identical, even if the clause is in a different location.
Using deviation scores in the metadata iSheet
Deviation scores are stored as metadata for the analysed contract. If you are using a File metadata iSheet, you may add a column and link it to the deviation metadata.
For example, the Contract deviation score column has been linked to the deviation score of each contract in this view:
You may then use this value for further analysis, to populate dashboard visualisations, or to trigger workflow rules.
You can access Contract deviation from the File metadata iSheet. Click the More actions icon on the left of an entry to see all options.
If you select more than one file, click Actions at the top of the iSheet, then select Assign AI and Assign contract template.
System and site admin
If the AI Hub is enabled on your instance, contract deviation analysis is normally enabled by default for the entire instance.
