Predictika · approvals, filings, disclosures and approval authority in an in-house legal team
Northgate Industries, a fictional company, lets AI agents prepare actions in its legal-ops suite. Before an action is released, the agent sends it to Predictika’s validator, which checks it against ethical walls, privilege review, approval limits, segregation of duties and filing deadlines, compares any contract value the agent states with the record, and returns a verdict with every reason.
This validator checks one proposed action at a time against a snapshot of the suite: who is acting and for whom, the matter, the contract or document, and the approval limits. It handles any contract, matter or document routed through these four action types, not just the scenarios shown below. It produces no price build-up, so there are no line items to show.
It does not cover clause-level redline review, legal research or the merits of a matter, and it does not replace attorney judgment.
9 scenarios in 4 groups · each group runs from the agent’s first attempt to the outcome · click one to switch
Illustrative agent statement. The validator receives the structured request below.
Proposing agent: AI sales agent (scripted)
Before sending, the agent must call Recorded run
What this means
Our assessment of what a typical rules-based approval workflow (the kind built into contract-management and matter-management suites) does with the same cases. It is a judgment about effort and reliability, not a claim that nothing can be built.
| What the validator catches | Typical rules-based approval workflow | Predictika |
|---|---|---|
| Ethical wall checked at the moment of action | Only with care Walls usually live in a conflicts database, so each approval, filing and disclosure step needs its own lookup. | Every action is checked against the matter's barred principal, whatever the action type. |
| The negotiator cannot also approve | Only with workarounds Needs a rule per approval path that compares two records, and it is easy to miss one path. | The approver is compared with the negotiator on every contract above the threshold. |
| Privilege review before disclosure | Only with care Review is often a workflow state, so any path that skips the step can still reach the release button. | Cleared review is a precondition of the disclosure action itself. |
| Filing deadline against today | Only with workarounds A deadline check is a separate date rule on each filing type. | The matter's deadline is compared with today on every filing. |
| Agents never change authority; nobody raises their own limit | Only with workarounds Role permissions say who may click, but comparing the actor with the person whose limit changes is a custom rule. | Both are hard rules, checked independently, so a request can fail both at once. |
| The contract value the agent states | Only with workarounds Approval rules rarely run on a figure the requester typed, so a wrong figure passes unless someone checks. | The stated value is a field in the request and is compared with the record. |
| Every problem returned in one answer | Only with workarounds Rules tend to fire one step at a time, so a requester fixes one error and meets the next. | All findings come back together, blocks first, then approval items. |
Every rule is checked on every call, in whatever order the choices arrive, and one problem never hides another. Blocking findings stop the action; approval findings need a person to sign off.
| Rule | Effect | What it checks |
|---|---|---|
| Stated contract value | block | The value the agent states must match the contract record within $1. |
| Ethical wall | block | The actor's principal must not be the matter's barred principal (approvals, filings, disclosures). |
| Same person negotiated and approves | block | The principal who negotiated a contract above $250,000 cannot approve it. |
| Far above approval limit | block | A contract worth more than double the approver's limit must go to General Counsel. |
| Above approval limit | needs approval | A contract above the limit, up to double, needs escalation to the next authority tier. |
| Filing deadline passed | block | A filing after the matter's deadline is time-barred and must be escalated. |
| Privileged document not yet cleared | block | A privileged document cannot be disclosed until privilege review is cleared. |
| Agents cannot change approval authority | block | An agent may never change approval limits or approval chains. |
| No one can raise their own limit | block | A principal cannot change their own approval limit. |
The recorded result of the validator for each scenario on this page: the request the AI agent sent, the verdict, and every finding, in the order they appear above.
The agent's request. Approving the Regional distribution agreement with Meridian Distribution LLC on behalf of Dana Reyes, Senior Counsel. Contract value $250,000. Ready to release.
Verdict: Blocked.
The agent's request. Approving the Regional distribution agreement with Meridian Distribution LLC on behalf of Dana Reyes, Senior Counsel. Contract value $300,000. Ready to release.
Verdict: Needs approval.
The agent's request. Approving the Regional distribution agreement with Meridian Distribution LLC on behalf of Grace Park, Deputy General Counsel. Contract value $300,000. Ready to release.
Verdict: Allowed.
The agent's request. Approving the Rival Systems term sheet on behalf of Dana Reyes, Senior Counsel, under the Rival Systems acquisition diligence matter. Contract value $400,000. Ready to release.
Verdict: Blocked.
The agent's request. Approving the Rival Systems term sheet on behalf of Grace Park, Deputy General Counsel, under the Rival Systems acquisition diligence matter. Contract value $400,000. Ready to release.
Verdict: Allowed.
The agent's request. Producing the Outside counsel strategy memo in the Harborview supply dispute on behalf of Marcus Oduya, Associate General Counsel. Ready to release.
Verdict: Blocked.
The agent's request. Producing the Outside counsel strategy memo (cleared) in the Harborview supply dispute on behalf of Marcus Oduya, Associate General Counsel. Ready to release.
Verdict: Allowed.
The agent's request. Raising Dana Reyes's approval limit to $500,000 on behalf of Dana Reyes, Senior Counsel. Ready to release.
Verdict: Blocked.
The agent's request. Raising Dana Reyes's approval limit to $400,000 on behalf of Grace Park, Deputy General Counsel. Ready to release.
Verdict: Allowed.
The text of the narrated walkthrough, step by step.