Checklist · Franchising & Distribution
Unfair contract terms review of a standard-form agreement
Review table for a standard-form franchise or distribution agreement against the unfair contract terms description on the ACCC page opened on 22 October 2026, including the small-business thresholds that page says changed on 9 November 2023.
- Kind
- Checklist. Steps or checks to work through and tick off.
- Where it applies
- Commonwealth
- AI use
- Yellow You and the tool draft together, with you directing. You check every statement you rely on.
- Law stated as at
- 22 October 2026
- Status
- Maintained. Checked on 22 October 2026 against the authority it cites, for Commonwealth.
- Version
- 1
- Source
- Written for this library
When to use it
Use when reviewing a standard-form franchise or distribution agreement for terms a court might find unfair, before any term is deleted or relied on.
Used for these tasks
Each task page says how far AI may help with the task and what the lawyer must review.
How AI may be used
The tool puts each term the lawyer nominates against the three-part description on the ACCC page, and the lawyer decides whether the term should be changed.
AI may
- List terms the lawyer nominates and note which of the three limbs on the ACCC page each one is said to meet.
- Record the contract date and which small-business threshold the ACCC page attaches to contracts before, and from, 9 November 2023.
- Mark an exclusion the ACCC page lists, when the lawyer says that exclusion may apply.
AI must not
- Do not decide that a term is unfair. The page says only a court can make that decision.
- Do not cite a section number of the Australian Consumer Law. The Act was not opened.
- Do not state a penalty. The penalties page was not opened.
The lawyer checks
- Check the contract date against 9 November 2023. The page says the new small-business thresholds replace the earlier ones for a new or varied standard-form contract from that date.
- The page says there is a presumption that a contract is a standard-form contract, and that the party who prepared it must prove that it is not.
- A term the page says is void if a court finds it unfair does not, on that page, bring down the rest of the contract if the contract can continue without it.
Method: how the Green, Yellow and Red levels are decided. This is guidance for planning, not legal advice.
Read the full text
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- read the whole precedent, with its drafting notes beside it;
- copy it, or download it as a Word file or Markdown;
- add it to your firm’s knowledge base, so colleagues can find it;
- let the AI tools you connect read it from that knowledge base.
The summary, the law it rests on and the AI-use guidance above stay public. Privacy.
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