1Who we are
BriefCounsel is provided by Atrium Capital (Pty) Ltd (registration number 2026/343577/07), a company incorporated in South Africa, trading as BriefCounsel (“Atrium”, “we”, “us”). Our registered address is 8 Harfield Road, Claremont, Cape Town, 7708. You can reach us at jethro@briefcounsel.ai, and our website is briefcounsel.ai. BriefCounsel is an AI-assisted application that helps legal practitioners draft and conduct legal research. These terms, together with our Privacy Policy, govern your access to and use of BriefCounsel.
2Agreeing to these terms
By creating an account, subscribing, or using BriefCounsel, you agree to these terms. If you use BriefCounsel for a firm or organisation, you confirm that you are authorised to bind it, and “you” includes that firm. We have written these terms in plain language; if anything is unclear, contact us before you subscribe.
3What BriefCounsel is — and what it is not
3.1BriefCounsel runs locally on the practitioner’s device and assists with drafting and legal research.
3.2Output is a drafting and research aid only. It is not legal advice and is not a professional service rendered by Atrium. Nothing in these terms creates any attorney-and-client relationship between Atrium and you, your clients, or anyone else.
3.3Output is generated by a large language model and may contain errors, omissions, or fabricated content. You must independently verify all Output before relying on it, acting on it, or using it in any work product.
4Your responsibilities
You remain fully and solely responsible for all work performed with BriefCounsel, including your duties under the Legal Practice Act 28 of 2014 and the Legal Practice Council’s Code of Conduct. In particular, you must:
- (a)review each prompt in its redacted form before it is transmitted, and satisfy yourself that all personal and identifying information has been removed;
- (b)apply your own professional judgement to, and verify, all Output before using it; and
- (c)keep your login credentials secure and ensure only authorised users access your account. You are responsible for all activity under your account.
5Acceptable use and intellectual property
5.1All intellectual property in BriefCounsel — including its software, the Redaction Engine, designs, and documentation — belongs to Atrium. You receive a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to use BriefCounsel for your own legal-practice purposes.
5.2You may not, and may not allow others to: reverse engineer or attempt to derive the source code or methods of BriefCounsel or the Redaction Engine; copy, resell, sublicense, or give third parties access to it; use it or its Output to train or build any competing model or product; remove any proprietary or branding notice; circumvent any security measure; or use BriefCounsel unlawfully, to transmit malicious code, or to gain unauthorised access to any system.
5.3Your data and the work product you generate remain yours. Any feedback or suggestions you give us become our property, and we may use them without obligation to you.
6Subscriptions, pricing and payment
6.1Plans. BriefCounsel is offered on monthly subscription plans. The current prices are R399, R799 and R1 199 per month, depending on the plan. The prices shown on our website are the full prices payable; where VAT applies, it is included in the price shown.
6.2Annual option. You may choose to pay for ten months upfront and receive twelve months’ access.
6.3Training. Optional training is available at R250 per seat.
6.4Credit top-ups. Additional usage credits may be bought at individually agreed prices. Credit top-ups are non-refundable, and any unused credits are forfeited when your subscription ends.
6.5Billing. Payments are processed by Paystack through a secure payment system. Monthly subscriptions renew automatically each month, and you authorise us to charge the applicable fee until you cancel. Before you confirm and pay, you can review your order and correct any mistake or withdraw from it.
6.6Price changes. We may change our prices on reasonable notice. A change does not affect a period you have already paid for.
7Cancelling
You may cancel at any time through your account or by emailing jethro@briefcounsel.ai. Cancellation takes effect at the end of your current paid period, and your access continues until then. Where you have paid upfront for a longer term, that term runs to its end.
8Refunds
8.1We do not give refunds once a billing period has started or once you have used the service. Cancelling stops future renewals; we do not refund the unused part of a period you have already paid for, including unused months on an upfront or annual plan.
8.2Cooling-off. If you are a natural person, you may cancel within seven days of concluding the agreement, without reason or penalty, provided you have not yet used BriefCounsel. Once you begin using BriefCounsel, you consent to us providing it immediately, and this seven-day right falls away.
8.3Training fees and credit top-ups are non-refundable.
8.4To ask about a refund, email jethro@briefcounsel.ai. We will respond within a reasonable time.
9No warranties
BriefCounsel is provided “as is” and “as available”. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we give no warranty that it will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that any Output will be accurate, complete, or fit for any purpose.
10Liability
10.1To the fullest extent permitted by law, Atrium and its subsidiaries are absolved from, and will have no, liability to you — whether in contract, delict, or otherwise — for any claim arising out of or in connection with BriefCounsel, these terms, or any Output, and you waive all such claims. In particular, we are not liable for any indirect or consequential loss, loss of profit or revenue, loss of data, reputational harm, or business interruption.
10.2Nothing in these terms excludes any liability that cannot lawfully be excluded, including liability for fraud, wilful misconduct, gross negligence, or death or personal injury caused by negligence.
11Your indemnity
You indemnify Atrium and its subsidiaries against all claims, losses, damages, fines, and reasonable legal costs arising from: any information you input that you had no lawful basis to process; any failure to review redacted content before it is transmitted; any breach of the AI provider’s terms; or any reliance on Output without the verification required by clause 4.
12Suspension and termination
We may suspend or terminate your access if you materially breach these terms. On termination, your licence ends immediately. Because your data sits on your own device, we hold nothing to return, and managing that data remains your responsibility.
13Third-party AI provider
BriefCounsel uses Anthropic as its AI provider, which processes only the redacted content sent from your device. You agree to Anthropic’s applicable terms of use and usage policy. We may change the AI provider and will update these terms where necessary.
14Changes to these terms
We may update these terms from time to time. We will post the updated version on our website, and your continued use means you accept it.
15Governing law and disputes
These terms are governed by South African law. Any dispute will first be referred to good-faith negotiation, then to mediation under the Arbitration Foundation of Southern Africa, and, failing resolution, to litigation in the Western Cape Division of the High Court, to whose non-exclusive jurisdiction you consent. Either party may still seek urgent interim relief from a competent court.
16General
These terms, with the Privacy Policy, are the whole agreement between us about BriefCounsel. If any provision is unenforceable, the rest continue to apply. A failure to enforce a term is not a waiver of it. Electronic acceptance is valid and binding. Formal notices to us go to jethro@briefcounsel.ai.