Everyone I know has a smartphone.  Everyone you know has a smartphone.  Ok, my mother does not have a smartphone.  But everyone else does.

According to Business Insider, 295 million new smartphones were shipped in Q2 alone.  That’s over a billion new cell phones a year!  And there are more than 1.2 million apps available for using your smartphone!

Everything is going mobile.  So, why not contracts?

Just imagine.  You are at a fancy restaurant.  You just close the deal with a new customer who says “let’s start right away.  Send me your contract.”  Ordinarily, you would say, “I’ll have my assistant send it to you in the morning.”  Instead, you say “No problem, I have it right here on my phone.”

Well, that’s just what happened to me this week.  I was meeting a potential business partner for lunch and I wanted to share some confidential information.  So, I installed the iPhone app from Shake, Inc.  The app was free and easy to use.

 

 

Rather than use the pre-installed agreements, I created my own.  And you can too…in 5 easy steps:

1. Select “Create Your Own” from the main menu.

2. Enter in the name of the parties.

3. Copy your agreement into the text box.

4. Click “Review Agreement”.

5. Sign on the dotted line, enter an email address, and hit “send”.

That’s it!

 

 

An email is automatically sent to both parties with a link to the signed agreement, which can be downloaded in PDF format.  You can use this application with any agreement.  To make it easier, customize the terms on your computer and then email the text to you smartphone.  If you need to make changes, you can edit the agreement on your smartphone before signing it.

 

 

There are other eSignature apps, but what I like about Shake is that it is easy to use and there’s no cost.  I don’t sign contracts on the go very often, but when I do it’s nice to know that I can just reach into my pocket rather than relying on just a handshake.

Could you use a mobile contract?  What for?

 

Roger Glovsky is a business lawyer who believes legal documents should be accessible, affordable and comprehensible. As author of ContractsGuru.com, Roger coaches business owners how to draft and negotiate their own contracts through workshops, teleseminars and online programs. As founder of LEXpertise.com, he plans to make it easier for business owners to find the right legal documents when they need them. Originally from Massachusetts, he now lives in Boulder, Colorado.