Saturday, September 19, 2009

The First Thing we Do, Let's Skill all the Lawyers

In the local office of a large car rental enterprise yesterday (whose name I will not reveal so as not to embarrass the enterprise) I had time to listen the Oliver-the-Clerk take Heather-the-Rent through the agreement form.

"You initial here; that says that ….", then "Initial here; that says that if you …."

Heather didn't strike me as stupid, and I know Oliver - he isn't stupid. We all know I'm bright, so that leaves us with The Lawyers.

Who designs an agreement that is so complex that a smartly-dressed professional must be assumed unable to comprehend it?

Why do we have a form that should be understood by anyone and yet is so complex that the clerk has to interpret it, every time, to every renter?

The whole thing is a farce, because it boils down to one of a few alternatives:

• Heather doesn't have a clue what she's signing, but wants to get out of here and on her way, so she'll sign anything. Where I come from we call this "Blackmail".

• Heather doesn't want to appear dense, so by agreeing to Oliver's words she can pretend that she also understand the legalese in 8-point Times New Roman. "Stupid".

• It being ten to six, and with three customers waiting, Oliver wants to drag out the scene for as long as possible so that he can work unpaid overtime and deal with three steaming customers. "Bad Business"

• The enterprise doesn't really care about its clients being part of the business deal, just as long as they (the enterprise) isn't out of pocket at the end of the day. "Greedy"

You ask me, lawyers should spent most of their lives in law school, and not be allowed to leave until they have mastered the art of getting an off-the-street agreement down to 500 words, none of which has more than two syllables.

The same, of course, applies to every "agreement" I've seen over the past ten years while installing downloaded Free Software. I'm of the mind that the only people who read the agreement through in full are lawyers, hoping to steal a few choice phrases they'd missed earlier in their career.

A housing loan, an apartment rental, in fact, anything that lasts more than a day, I can agree to several pages.

Why are marriage ceremonies arranged with less baffledygook than a one-day car rental?

Submit your suggestions for realistic 20-word agreements for

• A one-day car-rental

• A two-day motel room rental

• A one-week Caribbean beach-front cottage rental

• A six-month 400 square foot street-level office rental

• A one year apartment rental

• A bank mortgage on a $750,000 home (M9N 2L3)

• Your next marriage

The best entry in each category receives a free lunch at some place I can get to easily.

(I was going to stipulate "Must be within 3 miles of my home and/or office, must be taken within 4 weeks of winning, must not exceed a small Caesar salad with grilled chicken, no shirt no shoes ……", but I scared myself off.)

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