The efficient way to compare multiple documents at once

Whether you’re working on contracts with multiple counterparties, or reviewing dozens of corporate constitutions, there’s nothing more tedious than running each comparison one by one.

Multiple law firms approached the Draftable team with this problem. The ability to compare multiple documents quickly became the most highly requested feature for our legal document comparison software, Draftable Legal.

The team listened to legal professionals to understand their needs, and got to work, recently releasing Bulk Compare as part of Draftable Legal.

How to compare multiple documents at once with Bulk Compare

The Bulk Compare feature allows users to compare a single document to many other documents, all at the same time. This time-saving feature is perfect for when you’ve got multiple versions of a document and you need to compare each pair and find the differences fast.

Here’s how it works:‍

• You can load multiple (up to hundreds) of 'newer' documents to compare against a single original document and run the comparisons at the same time in seconds.
• Upload documents from your local files or DMS including iManage, NetDocuments, SharePoint, Worldox and Epona 365.
• You can still open, review and export each comparison independently or save all outputs in bulk with one action.

Choose the type of files to compare

You can upload a range of file types to run comparisons with Bulk Compare including:

• Word documents
• PDFs
• Excel documents
• PowerPoint documents
• Text files and free text
• Scanned PDF files (built-in OCR)

Choose your comparison output type

You can also choose how you want to view the comparison outputs including:

• Word with tracked changes
• PDF redline
• PDF with changed pages only
• PowerPoint with tracked changes
• Excel via Spreadsheet Compare
• Side-by-side

Read more about how to use Bulk Compare in this detailed Knowledge Base article.

Why would lawyers need to compare multiple documents?

Here are some of the ways law firms and legal teams are using Draftable Legal’s Bulk Compare feature.

Reviewing corporate constitutions

In corporate groups, ensuring that each subsidiary’s constitution aligns with the group's standards is crucial, especially during audits. Typically, these constitutions should only vary by name and minor jurisdictional details, and verifying consistency across dozens of entities can be cumbersome.

Draftable Legal’s Bulk Compare feature streamlines this process. Legal teams can upload a template or a previously reviewed constitution, alongside the constitutions of all sister companies. The tool automatically compares these documents against the template, highlighting any discrepancies beyond the expected differences.

Streamlining contract negotiations and reviews

If you’re in practice areas such as Banking & Finance or Real Estate, you spend a lot of time reviewing contracts and agreements. Managing these contracts can involve multiple parties leaving their changes and comments on the document, requiring careful review and integration of all changes into the original document.

Bulk Compare simplifies this, as you can upload the original contract or agreement, and the versions modified by each party. The software then runs all the comparisons at once, allowing for an efficient review of comments and amendments.

Read more: How to track changes in contracts during the review and negotiation process

Verifying template compliance across documents

In many law firms, specific document templates are established to ensure consistency and compliance with internal or regulatory standards. However, ensuring that various documents adhere to a designated template can be a time-consuming task, especially when numerous documents are involved.

With the Bulk Compare feature, users can upload the master template into the Draftable launcher, along with the batch of documents that are supposed to have been produced using this template. You can run all the comparisons at once and quickly identify any differences in each document, including in the structure, formatting and content.

Read more: Where to find legal document templates?

What are the benefits of using Bulk Compare for comparing multiple documents?

• Speed and efficiency: With fast bulk comparisons, this feature reduces the time spent on tedious manual comparisons, allowing legal professionals to focus on the work that matters.
• Accuracy: The reliable software minimises human error in document review by ensuring all changes and differences are highlighted in each document.
• Scalability: Draftable Legal can handle hundreds of documents effortlessly, which is particularly beneficial for large firms or complex cases with dozens of documents and versions.

You can try out the Bulk Compare feature with a free five-day trial of Draftable Legal. Start your trial here or get in touch with our experts to find out more.

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