You will be able to catch an explanation that is smoother or more generous than the actual wording.
Wei Jie, from lesson 3.2, The clauses worth asking about first, pasted the early termination clause from his lease into an assistant and asked for a plain explanation. The answer was one tidy sentence: "You can end the lease early with two months' notice if your employer moves you out of Singapore." He was relieved. It was also wrong in three ways that would have cost him money, and nothing in the tone suggested it.
Assistants are good at making difficult text readable. The trouble is that readable usually means shorter, and shorter means something was left out. This lesson is about catching what went missing.
A language model has read thousands of tenancy agreements, insurance policies and loan terms. When it summarises yours, it is pulled towards the version of that clause it has seen most often. Where your wording matches the common one, that pull helps. Where your wording is stricter, narrower or just different, the summary can slide back to the familiar version without any sign that it did.
So an explanation can be accurate about clauses like yours in general and still be wrong about yours. That is why lesson 3.1, Get an explanation that quotes the clause back, asked for the source sentence beside each point. This lesson is where you use those quotes.
For each point in the explanation, cover the summary with your hand and read only the quoted sentence. Then ask yourself four questions about that sentence.
Is there a condition, a "provided that" or an "if", that the summary left out? Is there a number, such as a period, an amount, a percentage or an age, and did the summary keep it exactly? Is there an exception, an "except", "unless" or "other than", that changes who or what is covered? Does the sentence say "shall" or "will" where the summary says "can", or the other way round?
Mark anything the summary dropped or changed. Write the correction in your own words beside it.
Here is the kind of wording Wei Jie's clause used. It's an example written for this lesson, not a standard form: "The Tenant may terminate this Agreement after the expiry of twelve months of the term, provided that the Tenant has been transferred out of Singapore by the Tenant's employer, by giving not less than two months' written notice together with documentary proof of the transfer, and the Tenant shall reimburse the Landlord a proportionate part of the commission paid to the agent."
Against the four questions, the summary failed three times. It dropped the condition that twelve months must have passed first, which was the whole of Wei Jie's problem at month eleven. It dropped the requirement for written notice with proof. And it dropped the commission he would have to repay. The one thing it kept, two months' notice, was the part least likely to hurt him.
Most of what a summary loses lives in a handful of short words. "May" gives someone a choice, often the insurer or the landlord, not you. "Subject to" means another clause can override this one. "Unless" and "except" carve out cases. "Provided that" adds a condition. "At the discretion of" means there's no promise at all.
A summary that turns "the Company may pay" into "the plan pays" has changed a possibility into a promise. One that drops "subject to clause 9" has removed a limit you didn't know was there. When you see any of these words in the quoted text, follow them. If a clause says "subject to clause 9", go and read clause 9, and paste it too if you need it explained.
Sometimes you'll compare the summary with the text and still not know what the clause means for you. The wording is ambiguous, or it depends on a definition that isn't clear, or it refers to a schedule you don't have.
Don't ask the assistant to decide. It can only guess, and it will guess towards the common version again. Ask the other party: the insurer, the bank, the landlord or their agent. Ask in writing, by email or through the provider's secure message channel, and quote the clause number in your question. A written answer gives you a record, and a vague one tells you something too.
Wei Jie emailed his landlord's agent quoting the clause. The reply confirmed that the twelve-month period applied and that the commission refund would be pro-rated. He had a month to plan for both instead of finding out on the day.
Now go back to the explanation you got in lesson 3.1 and put it beside the clause it came from.
Compare your explanation from lesson 3.1 with the clause line by line and mark anything the summary dropped or changed.
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