For subcontractors
Contract Review for Subcontractors & Tradies
Subcontractors sign the industry's worst contracts: drafted upstream, passed down on a take-it-or-leave-it basis, and priced as if the risk clauses will never bite. Contract review for subcontractors is about one thing — protecting the cash you've already earned — and it starts before you sign.
What the review gives you
- Cash-flow clauses flagged first
- Statutory payment rights called out
- Concrete negotiation asks per finding
- US$19 per contract — pay when you need it
Why subbies get the worst terms
Head contractors flow risk down: the LDs, the design gaps, the program risk they accepted upstream get pushed into your subcontract, often amplified. You carry the labour and material cost up front, then the contract decides when — and whether — the money comes back. That's why review effort should follow the cash.
Cash flow first: the four clauses that decide it
Pay-when-paid clauses make your money contingent on someone else's. Retention holds 5% hostage for years. Uncapped LDs can eat the whole margin. Time bars quietly delete claims you've already earned. Every subcontract review starts with these four.
Your statutory rights survive the contract
In every market ContractorCounter Review covers, payment-protection law overrides contract terms: security of payment in Australia, the UK Construction Act, prompt payment in Canada, the NZ Construction Contracts Act, and US prompt-payment and lien laws. A good review flags clauses that pretend those rights away.
Fits how you actually bid
You priced the job from the drawings — the contract arrives after, with the risk attached. Drop it into ContractorCounter Review before you return it: US$19, every risky clause highlighted with a concrete negotiation ask, and the full checklist covered without an afternoon of reading.
Questions contractors ask
Why do subcontractors need contract review more than GCs?
Because subcontracts are where risk lands. Head contractors have commercial teams and lawyers on retainer; subcontractors get the flowed-down version of every risk with none of that support. The clauses that hurt most — pay-when-paid, uncapped LDs, short time bars, oversized retention — are aimed specifically at the subcontract level, and the subbie is usually the least equipped party to spot them.
Can't I just sign and rely on my rights?
Statutory payment rights help — security-of-payment and prompt-payment laws void some of the worst clauses regardless of what you signed. But statute doesn't cap liquidated damages, fix a one-sided indemnity, rewrite ambiguous scope, or restore a claim you lost to a valid notice requirement. The contract still governs most of the relationship; the review tells you which parts of it to push back on while you still can.
How much does an AI construction contract review cost?
ContractorCounter Review costs a flat US$19 per contract, whatever the page count — no subscription, no account, no demo call. The AI reads the contract and shows you what it found (how many issues, how severe, on which pages) before you pay anything; the $19 unlocks the full marked-up review with every clause highlighted and a plain-English concern and negotiation ask for each.
Is my contract kept private?
The contract PDF never leaves your browser — only its extracted text is processed to produce the review, and it is not used to train AI models. Unpurchased findings expire after 7 days; paid reviews remain available for 12 months from the last access.
Is this legal advice?
No. ContractorCounter Review is an AI-powered first-pass review that flags risky, one-sided, and ambiguous clauses so you know exactly what to question. It is not a law firm and its output is not legal advice — for contracts worth serious money, take the marked-up review to a construction lawyer and spend their billable hours on judgment instead of reading.