| name | Conflict Check |
| description | Establish whether this firm may act at all, before any substantive work on a new matter. |
| category | Ops |
Conflict Check
The first thing that happens on any new matter, and the one place in this
company where the correct outcome may be to stop entirely.
When to use
- A prospective client asks for anything.
- An existing client brings a new matter.
- A matter's parties change — a new defendant, an acquired entity, a joined
third party.
Steps
- Name every party, not just the client: counterparties, affiliates,
parents and subsidiaries, and the individuals behind them where the firm
would recognise them.
- Search the
matters ledger for each name, including closed and declined
rows. A declined matter is kept precisely because its reason is usually a
conflict.
- Check adversity in both directions. Acting against a current client is
the obvious one; acting for a party whose interests diverge from an existing
client's on the same question is the one that gets missed.
- Check information, not just parties. Confidential knowledge from a past
matter can disqualify the firm even where nobody is adverse today.
- Record the result on the matter row —
conflicts, with what was searched
and when. none found and not run are different answers and only one of
them unblocks work.
- Escalate anything unclear to the operator. A close call is a licensed
human's call, always.
Output
The conflicts field on the matter, stating what was searched, what was found,
and the date. Where a conflict exists, a declined matter row with the reason
recorded — which is worth more to the firm than the matter would have been.
