Digital banking pioneer Revolut is to offer ‘affordable legal services‘ to its 300,000 business customers through the Sparqa Legal online platform. The move follows a very similar deal with rival digital banking trailblazer, Starling Bank, in December 2019.
The partnership marks Revolut’s first alliance with a legal platform.
It’s also another example of private businesses making an effort to fill the access to justice gap created by the high cost of traditional legal services. Some estimates suggest the majority of SMEs in the UK do not use a lawyer even when they have a legal issue, due to fears over the cost of engaging a firm to help them.
Sparqa – which Artificial Lawyer profiled in February last year – provides a legal document store, a bit similar to that seen with LegalZoom and RocketLawyer – but importantly it also provides ‘legal guidance’ on how to handle a variety of issues an SME may face, from how to fire an employee, to which contract to use for a new business premises.
Revolut Business customers can now sign up to the Sparqa Legal platform for free and get a small credit towards customisable legal contracts, policies and documents. These include privacy policies, employment contracts, terms and conditions and trademark applications, as well as data protection and health and safety-related documents.
Vaidas Adomauskas, Head of Business Product at Revolut, said: ‘This new partnership between Revolut Business and Sparqa Legal will put affordable legal services at the fingertips of our customers. Legal services is yet another new area where we are excited to further empower our business customers.’
Andrew Thornton, Founder of Sparqa Legal and a barrister at Erskine Chambers, concluded: ‘Our mission is to make the law accessible and empower businesses to fulfil many of their legal requirements outside of traditional law firms.
‘On average businesses face legal issues eight times a year, yet 87% do not have any internal or external legal capacity. We believe passionately that armed with the right tools, and resources, smart business managers can produce many of the simple legal documents they require. They can also find out about their rights, obligations and the best course to take.’