Could you imagine at the extremes if you had been refused treatment because of your refusal to sign this document, to which you knew to be untrue, and to which they could not provide you with the policy.
I studied law for four years (haven't qualified) , but I'm still not even sure on the liability on this one (if there is any at all in this hypothetical).
It just shows how bureaucratic everything has become when a privacy policy contains 3000 pages, to which they clearly never refer to, and to which you are most likely the first person to have ever asked to actually see the policy.
Additionally, what about the fact that if the woman knew the Privacy Policy was 3000 pages and in a binder (which she claimed to be aware of) and knowingly accepts a statement she strongly believes to be untrue? Is this enough to invalidate the "contract" because it is blatantly known that full disclosure and meeting of the minds has not been met?
This also comes to mind during mortgages and car loans. Often the closer will just hand you a stack of papers and say "you need to initial here, here, and here, sign here, here, and here" and then expect/anticipate the person to do just that without reading the agreement. The closer ought to know that the signer has not actually read the document and therefore the initials and signatures don't represent what they are meant to represent... that the person has READ the whole thing and mindfully agreed to it! Agh!
I the first time I closed on a house, realizing ten minutes in that either I was going to be signing contracts without reading them, or everyone was going to be sitting around watching me read for three hours. There's a lot of pressure in a situation like that, even though I try never to sign anything without reading it.
Did you have a lawyer to represent you? That's their job... to make sure that the contract you're signing is OK. Actually reading a contract without knowledge of the law, case history, and background can get you into just as much trouble as not reading it at all. That's why you have lawyers review important contracts.
The first time I rented a car, I spent 10 minutes reading the rental agreement. I don't do that any more; I just glance at it and sign it.
I am not a lawyer. Suppose a rental car matter ended up court. I would rather not have to say to the judge, "I spent 10 minutes thoughtfully reading and evaluating the contract, and after careful consideration decided to accept the agreement." I would rather be able to say, "Gee, it was printed in gray ink in tiny type on the back of the paper, and they told me to just sign here on the front to get the car. I needed the car, so I did what they told me."
I never accept the "standard contract" when it comes to employment or consulting gigs - then I always read carefully, propose alterations, and often talk to my lawyer. But if it really is a "standard contract" signed by millions (including, presumably, lots of lawyers, too) then I am inclined to balance the risks and benefits and opt for ignorance over informed consent.
I always read employment contracts before signing them, too. Last time I did this, the contract said something to the effect of, "The company can modify this agreement at any time without notifying the employee." I immediately crossed out that clause and initialed.
Does that actually work? Is it enforceable? I would imagine that if you sent back a contract with modifications for their review that they would balk at hiring or you would get involved with the lawyers who are so much better at legal negotiating than you are.
I definitely would not do that with a consulting contract. The chance that something weird would come up is generally worth it to get a good client.
Yes, it's legal and enforceable. Your signature is on the contract that you sign, not on some mythical un-marked-up copy.
In fact, this is often a good negotiating tactic: someone hands you a contract, and they just want to get it signed.
You strike out the price and write in a new price (or whatever), initial it, sign it, and hand it back.
The psychic weight is now on them - they have a SIGNED CONTRACT and all they need to do is to sign it themselves.
Taking the conceptual step backwards from a contract (albeit only signed by one party) to a contract signed by NEITHER party is a bit hard to do.
IANAL, but if you cross something out of a contract, sign it, and the counterparty also signs the contract, then the part you struck out is not part of the contract. The trick is getting the other person who's signing the contract to sign it even though you've crossed things out.
In my experience, people and organizations often purposely make their contracts over-reaching just to be on the safe side, and expect savvy customers/partners to cross those overreaching items off.
I never accept the "standard contract" when it comes to employment or consulting gigs - then I always read carefully, propose alterations, and often talk to my lawyer.
Have you ever worked at a large company? Did this work?
I feel like at large companies, this would be like trying to modify the language of a car rental agreement, and the HR rep would just be confused.
Large company. East-coast based. Where non-competes are legal and common.
Working on the left coast, I demurred.
I got the left-coast version of the contract, no non-compete.
In other circumstances, I might request a substantial portion (up to or exceeding 100% of my salary, given that actual costs typically run 140-200% of salary) for the duration of any noncompete. Consideration.
In this particular case, when the property I was working for was divested (and riffed) some time later, I has fully unencumbered. Others had noncompetes, though these were not valid in that state. I'm not aware of any action being taken on the basis of that contract, but noncompetes can and have been enforced (notably recently between Microsoft and Google trading employees back and forth).
That said, this is precisely the sort of thing a labor union or professional guild would be in a very good position to make more acceptable standard boilerplate for.
Fortunately those agreements are fairly standard between the major rental companies, so the future contracts are not going to change much. You still know general gotcha's while renting a car now.
When I bought a house (and later sold it), the day before, we had the title company forward all of the documents to our lawyer to review. When he gave his okay, I felt perfectly comfortable signing multiple documents that I never read.
For something like that, it's important to have someone with some knowledge go over things first. Was I really going to be in a position to slowly read over documents for 3 hours and potentially hold up closing just because I didn't understand a contract? No. So, it's best to let a lawyer do his/her job.
I remember when I bought a house I had to sign tens of such notices and notices about signing notices, etc. Worse yet, I was actually provided with all the documents I was supposed to review, and they literally were a pile several inches high. And most of it was completely 100% useless at worst and duplicating what my agent already told me about 10 times at best and what I already read about in various disclosure forms (which I had to sign too, of course). It took me hours to get through it and by the end of it my hand hurt from all signing I had to do. Some politicians did some major CYA work there, I'm sure.
It's better than not reading it, but you still don't really know what you're signing. Maybe there's some catch or you're on the hook for something and the lawyer doesn't say anything (or even notice) because it's relatively standard for that kind of contract?
Probably a better use of time and money is to have them forward the documents to you, read over them the day before and ask a lawyer if you have any questions.
Except, I'm not a lawyer... so if there is something, then I probably wouldn't catch it either. At some point, you have to trust professionals to do their job.
Buying a house is a bit different though, because you have the purchase agreement and then you have the contracts you sign at closing. We examined the purchase agreement in depth with our lawyer, since that is what sets the context for the rest of the transaction documents. However, once that was out of the way, there was no need for us to read anything - so long as our lawyer signed off on it.
It also depends on how much you trust your lawyer...
> Except, I'm not a lawyer... so if there is something, then I probably wouldn't catch it either. At some point, you have to trust professionals to do their job.
Right, which is why I suggested asking a lawyer if anything in the contract was unclear.
IMO, it seems like having the lawyer read it without reading it yourself is just deferring the decision to the lawyer. How can you convey to the lawyer what you're okay agreeing too, and what you would take issue with? What are you getting out of it above and beyond the "Everybody signs it, so it can't be too bad," approach?
What if, after signing the contract, you find out there's a clause you disagree with, but the lawyer tells you, "Oh, I didn't think you'd mind because that clause is in all of the contracts like this and everybody else is always okay with it."
Maybe it really just depends on how well a person knows and trusts their lawyer?
Legalese might hide problematic things without your knowing about it. It may very well take a lawyer to spot those issues in the first place, lines which you might gloss over as harmless.
This has to be one of the most exploited (mis?)conceptions of the 21st century. Doctors, employers, websites, software plugins, account agreements, almost everything with which one interacts in the normal course of a modern life has a massive privacy statement that, using the unnatural jargon of the law as a gate, makes unreasonable statements which destroy the rights of the consumer and create rights for the provider. I recall a recent trip to the eye doctor where the standard document made the statement that I pre-consent to any and all treatment that the doctor orders and pre-agree to be financially responsible for all such treatments in case my insurance does not pay. My guess is that most of us have inadvertently pre-consented our finances and other aspects of our lives to various companies via these statements buried within the haystack of legalese that must be "signed" in order to operate a 21st century life.
That makes about as much sense as, "Paying a developer to write your code is no excuse for not also writing it yourself."
The lawyer is a profession. His or her job is to read and review contracts, just like my job is to write code. Does your boss rewrite every line of code you write? When you take your car to a mechanic, do you insist on re-doing all of the repairs yourself? So why are you insisting on rereading contracts that your lawyer has already reviewed?
Well, right, but that's no justification for repeating the lawyer's work. That's an argument for making your business requirements clear to the lawyer.
It's the same argument for both law and programming. Badly communicated requirements yield bad results.
If course we're supposed to read it but in some situations it's not realistic. Buying a house involves hundreds of pages. Unless you're a lawyer, the average person isn't going to recognize loopholes in the contracts. And I don't know many people who would back out on a house sale at that stage, so it's highly unlikely you'd refuse to sign. The only practical way to do that is to get an advance copy of everything.
In these cases you really do need a lawyer who you trust has read the documents and is protecting you.
I read each and every page before I purchased my home. I highlighted everything I didn't understand. Most pages looked like bumble bees. I worked questions during a 5 hour session with my realtor. For terms I now understood but didn't agree with, I had two options depending on the type of term it was:
1. Government and HOA stuff was not changing. I could accept it or walk.
2. Seller stuff could change. We made some minor requests and largely got them.
Reasoning:
We were spending 6 figures. The quality of my work would have a major impact on my family for a long time to come. I was newly married and this was my first family related big project. I was damn sure going to understand how interest rates and loans work ("whats a point?", "fixed vs float") and what legal junk we might be getting into.
I got a chance to learn a little about real estate. When life throws you a stack of legal documents, make lemonade.
I also got to vet out the agent. I work hard and have had some business success. I figured one day it would be time for another house and it would be nice to have a long term relationship with a trusted realtor on that one too.
Core point: it is your name on the document, it is a lot of money, it impacts your feature. Exactly how lazy are you to not read it?
I wouldn't consider anyone lazy for hiring an attorney to read the fine print and summarize it, rather than reading every word. It's not a matter of laziness, it's a matter of actually protecting yourself. It doesn't hurt anything to read the documents, but it's not a substitute for actual legal counsel.
I also would not trust my real estate agent explaining the contract to me. Just like you should never go with your real estate agent recommended house inspector. Your real estate agent may be the nicest person on earth, but they have a vested interest in the deal going through. It's prudent to find your own attorney and housing inspector who are not associated with each other.
Nobody really tells you these things unfortunately and it is scary as hell making that first house purchase!
How much would it cost to get a lawyer to go over some contracts with you and let you know what's in there that you don't want? I imagine it depends on the type of contract, but a guess would be helpful.
Depends on where you are. In SF, you're looking at a minimum of about $200 an hour (for a fairly inexperienced lawyer, who will take longer). If you want a 10 year lawyer who actually knows what he's doing, you're looking at about $300-$600 (depending on experience, what kind of firm he's at, etc.). Lawyers don't read much faster than you would, so you can basically do the math on what to expect, based on the size of the stack of documents you want read.
If it's a three page contract, and you don't have an existing relationship with the attorney, you'll probably just be charged a flat fee of a couple hundred bucks, or nothing, depending on what sort of other business you might bring in.
In germany for certain contracts (such as buying a house or creating a LLC) it's required that a notary reads them aloud for you. That's quite a bit of fun if the contract contains annotations that make it fill a binder. There are some loopholes though: The contract may refer to another document that the notary may read to his assistant, so not everybody has to go through the whole ordeal.
Yeah we have that too in the Netherlands, at least for the important portions of the documents. The last time I closed on a house it took over two hours.
All relevant documents had been e-mailed to us beforehand but you still cannot ask them to skip the reading. Being too careful can be annoying too.
I recently closed on a house in Ohio. At closing, the notary verbally summarized every contract we signed. I'm not sure if it was legally required (I believe he stated it was) but I also took the time to read them. Most of them were copies of contracts I had already signed with the realtor / mortgage company at offer / mortgage application, so nothing was particularly surprising.
Further, at offer time, the realtor read aloud every contract and answered questions we had about them. I don't feel that they tried to pull the wool over my eyes at any point. Perhaps it's different with other realtors?
I subscribe to the 'when you're in a bank, read everything, even if it takes four hours' theory. The last time I set up a really simple business chequing account, the account manager:
- spelled my name wrong
- spelled the company name wrong
- claimed that I was an electrician
- listed my job title as 'oner'
None of these are terribly material errors, but they demonstrate just how frequently errors occur in financial documents. Frankly, it makes me queasy to imagine all the errors that could pop up in a mortgage document...
An obvious construction error. Just as one who plays piano isn't called a "pianoer", the account manager must have meant "onanist". Did you finally strike him in the face with your gloves?
Yup. When I closed on my home I had to figure out to handle that too. It blows the minds of the people in the room away if you sit there and read over the thing... and then ask questions for clarifications. It also [sometimes can] pisses them off cause they plan on 15 to 30 minutes for closing... so if you take your time and go over it ask questions it throws their whole schedule off. When I refinanced the credit union was smart enough to send copies of what I would be signing ahead of time so I could read over it and ask any questions prior to the ceremony of signing it in front of the notary public.
Ask for the documents in advance. Tell the title agency that if you don't get copies in advance you'll happily sit in the room and read them all at closing. Call them a few times to remind them that your are "Really looking forward to reading every word of those contracts". They want deals to close smoothly and will provide you with the documents.
I sat through some classes on how title companies worked, and the closer (the person at the title company who manages the entire process) refers to you as a "reader." Somewhat unusual, but not that uncommon. (I was a reader when I bought my house years ago.) RESPA requires that all significant costs be listed on a sheet available 24 hours before closing, and you can press your rights on that, though it may delay your closing by one day. That gives you the time to read all the documents before everyone collects in person. And everyone does not need to be in the same room at the same time, of course. Closing documents may be FEDEXed around the world, if necessary, and some real estate investing dual closings (flips) very much depend on everyone NOT seeing all the documents.
I usually ask beforehand for a copy of anything I'm expected to sign. If the other party refuses, I have no qualms with sitting, reading and inquiring as long as necessary.
I took my time during the only closing I've been part of. Every time I worked with my bank, I'd find some small but meaningful mistake in the paperwork. So I didn't trust that closing documents would all be correct. The funny thing is, nobody seemed to mind because they seemed amused to have someone finally reading through the paperwork and asking interesting questions.
By all means read the documents that are actually contracts.
But those are only a few pages. The rest of the documents you have to sign when closing a real estate purchase are mostly boilerplate disclosures about mold, asbestos, flood zones, penalties for fraud, etc ad nauseum. Anything that's actually important in the disclosures you'll already know about if you did your pre-purchase investigation properly. So there's no point in wasting time reading those disclosures in detail during the closing.
When we closed our house we not only read through the entire stack of mortgage papers, we had a several hour session where the escrow representative went line by line and explained everything to us. It is always good to understand what you are signing, especially a 30 year mortgage contract. However many of the statements we signed very worded in a way that a lawyer can interpret it in any way so the liability falls on us!
Since it's big money that I would be on the hook for, you bet I make them wait while I read the contract front to back. Yes, it annoys the escrow officer, but too bad.
Yeah, car loan signing wasn't as bad and the bank and credit union folks I've dealt with were surprisingly patient... they are surprised when people actually read the agreements though... I think it makes them feel better knowing the person is actually reading what they are agreeing to. Also car loans are many times less complex and have less paperwork than mortgages (thanks in part to all the additional paperwork and contract(s) needed in order to prep the mortgage so that it can be sold to fannie/freddie).
The worst experience I've had with this sort of thing is under release from jail. I've been arrested 3 times for civil disobedience actions and each time on my way out the officer on duty told me to sign some papers indicating the conditions of my release, that I've received all my property, etc. Each time, when I began to read the papers before signing them, they've told me if I don't sign them without reading them, they would put me back in my cell and hold me at least another few hours.
After my first arrest, they would not release me until I signed a paper saying that I received all my property but would not let me inspect my property first. They put my bag of property on the floor across the room and said I could stand about ten feet away from the bag to look at it. Needless to say, once I actually received my bag, I found that there was property missing. Nothing of great value (a hat, a bandana), but it was still pretty irritating.
> Each time, when I began to read the papers before signing them, they've told me if I don't sign them without reading them, they would put me back in my cell and hold me at least another few hours.
Wouldn't that the document since it was signed under duress?
Yes, but who are you going to complain to? The very same cops that just broke the law?
Or maybe he should go through the legal system? He'll spend more money fighting it than anything he lost is worth. And it'll make his life a lot harder.
I'd love to see him fight it, but I certainly don't look down on him for not.
Yea. So, I should be clear that each time I signed the documents despite not having read them first. I did not pursue any legal action mostly because I did not have much tangible cost associated with the threats. Perhaps had I refused to sign without reading and they actually did hold me longer I would have some sort of case, but even then, what value will a court assign to 4 hours of my life? Police seem to have a lot of leeway to make your life difficult without much recourse.
If there's one thing I've learned about the legal system from my arrest and court experiences, it's that just because the police do something wrong does not mean that you can stop them from doing it. People don't get their miranda read, they don't get to make a phone call to let anyone know where they are, they don't get their medication, they don't get a meal in line with their religious or dietary restrictions, they don't get a clean bathroom, and they certainly don't get treated with any modicum of decency. Well, it's not really anything you can prove and even if you could a judge won't care much because it's hard to assess damages for intangibles like that and the public won't care much because you broke the law and deserve what you get. It's a pretty fucked system.
The guy I was talking to was amused when I actually read what I was signing while purchasing my car. It asked me to sign saying I had received something, which was going to be printed next. He said I was the first person to refuse to initial/sign the paper until I had seen the next item on the list.
The privacy policy wasn't 3000 pages. Either Stallman didn't remember the story correctly, or more likely the receptionist was just making up a number to scare him off pursuing the issue. Even the thickest novels don't make it to 3000 pages; very few make it to 1000.
Hell, I'd be surprised if the privacy policy hit 3 pages.
I think you're nit picking and not focusing on the point. Regardless of the length (the lady either knew or didn't know how long the thing was) she didn't have it nor did she provide it to the gentleman to read. The office was still asking him to lie by requiring him to state he received and read something he obviously didn't receive nor read.
Same. I've been to multiple doctors, and each time, the "privacy policy" (either a HIPAA form or something similar) was included on the paper I was signing.
That's not to say Stallman's experience did not happen, but it is certainly not the norm.
That small brochure was only a subset of their privacy policy. The actual policy could not possible fit onto a brochure and as the OP said the form he was signing had a summary of the policy which is similar to your brochure.
Given that the two of you are talking of this 3000-page policy as if it's real, it's definitely on-topic to reveal that it isn't. Condoning hyperbole is never good, but it is ironic to do so in the course of condemning unnecessary beaurocracy.
If you want to fix things, seek the truth before making decisions on obvious falsities.
I wish the downmod brigade would actually read what I wrote. I'm not calling Stallman a liar. I'm saying he may have made a mistake in telling the story. It happens. I also said that it was more likely that the receptionist made up the number to scare him off.
If you read an article, the author is responsible for putting the words in it, whatever the original source is. The author can make mistakes, because authors are human. I'm just saying that it's a possibility he misquoted the number in his article, a possibility I stated to be less likely than other other source I suggested.
I understand the point of the article. I was responding to a couple of comments that were acting like this 3000-word thing was real, when it clearly isn't, and drawing conclusions about how crazy beaurocracy has become that documents get so long.
Can you please quote me the line where I specifically say that? I said he might have made a mistake in the retelling of 'the story', not that he was the actor that said it was 3000 pages long.
"The privacy policy wasn't 3000 pages. Either Stallman didn't remember the story correctly…"
So if he was incorrect, about what was he incorrect? Nowhere does he say the document was 3000 pages long, he says he was told it was 3000 pages long (he may have been be embellishing, the person he was quoting may have been exaggerating, but he was not incorrectly stating the document to have been 3000 pages.
After multiple clarifications, you are still misreading me. I specified that I did not say Stallman was the actor in the story that stated -foo-, but that he is retelling a story in which he recounts the words of others, who did state -foo-.
I don't know how to make it clearer to you - even the snippet you quote is my words talking about him possibly not recalling the story quite right. I'm not saying he stated it was 3k words, but that it's possible that his recounting of another person's words might not be remembered correctly.
I have no axe to grind against Stallman, and if you look through my posting history, you'll see that there's been a few times that I've defended him against people who attack him as a figurehead rather than on the merits of what he actually said. This is partly why it's so frustrating for me to be taken out of context here and condemned for it.
I've also been misspelling bureaucracy... I thought it looked odd that way.
I suspect the "downmod brigade" read what you wrote, and is trying to silence the needless nitpicking on the alleged page count of the policy document that no one has seen. What if he had said "5", would that have changed the issue at all? Are you going to nit on the color of the wallpaper too?
It just shows how bureaucratic everything has become when a privacy policy contains 3000 pages, to which they clearly never refer to, and to which you are most likely the first person to have ever asked to actually see the policy.
Best wishes with your health Richard!