When you hire new professionals or agree to specific terms when working with other New York businesses, you may use contracts to help protect yourself and your lifeblood. If you leave anything open to interpretation when drafting your contract, though, you raise the chances of finding yourself embroiled in a potentially nasty contract dispute.
Contract disputes, at best, divert time and attention away from your business’s operations. In some cases, they could cause you to lose everything you have worked hard to amass. According to Inc.com, learning what steps may help prevent contract disputes is a critical part of running a business. To cut the chances of your company finding itself involved in a contract dispute, take care to:
Enlist the aid of a notary
When a notary signs a particular document, he or she is certifying the validity of that document. Many contract disputes arise because the people signing the document either did not read it well enough or try to claim they never signed it. Having a notary there when all parties sign it helps prevent disputes that might otherwise arise in these circumstances.
Make sure the proper parties sign the contract
Sometimes, contract disputes arise because the party who signs the contract never had the authority to do so. For this reason, it is advisable that you verify that the people who sign the contract are who they claim to be and have the authority to do so.
Eliminate anything vague
You also want to comb through your contract closely and eliminate or alter any language that may leave things open to interpretation. If anything in your document is uncertain, those who sign it may have grounds to question its validity later.
