Demand Intake Skill for Claude

/demand-intake

• Load ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md → demand-letter practice, landscape, risk calibration.
• Follow the workflow and reference below.
• Run the adaptive intake (core 8 always; strategic block if material or --full).
• Generate slug from title + counterparty + year-month.
• Write ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/[slug]/intake.md.
• Confirm with user: "Intake saved. Run /litigation-legal:demand-draft [slug] when ready."

Demand Intake

Purpose

The drafting is downstream. The value is in the pre-writing — forcing the questions a careless letter skips. Leverage, BATNA, downside tolerance, privilege filters, the actual audience. A demand letter sent without thinking about those is worse than no letter.

Load context

• ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md → Demand-letter practice (insurance-tender timing, materiality threshold for matter creation, any seed-doc templates), landscape (counterparty type, repeat-adversary patterns), risk calibration (to pre-estimate materiality), house style. Tone, compliance period, marking, signer are NOT practice-level defaults — they are set per matter in the ## Posture for this matter step below.

Flags

• --full → run the complete intake regardless of materiality heuristics (for counsel who wants thorough every time)

The intake

Posture for this matter (ask FIRST, before the core)

> Posture for this matter. Demand-letter tone and terms are case-by-case, not a practice default. Ask:

> - Tone: measured / assertive / aggressive? (depends on the relationship, the amount, and whether litigation is likely)

> - Response window: what's reasonable given the claim? (14 days is common for payment demands; 30 days for cure; 7 days for cease-and-desist — but the contract or protocol may set it)

> - Marking: does this need a "without prejudice" or "without prejudice save as to costs" marking? (settlement communications do; assertions of claim often don't; jurisdiction matters — ask if unsure)

> - Signer: you, the client, the GC, instructed solicitor/counsel?

> Don't assume. Read the prior demand correspondence in the matter file if there is any — it establishes the register.

Record the answers in the intake under a ## Posture section before ## Parties. These answers govern the rest of the intake and the downstream draft — do not fall back to a practice-level default if the user left any of them blank; ask again.

Core — always asked (8 questions)

1. Demand type

payment | breach-cure | cease-desist | employment-separation | preservation | other

2. Parties

• Sender: our company (and any specific entity if multi-entity)
• Recipient: counterparty — name, entity, address
• Recipient audience: who actually reads (GC? CEO? individual? in-house legal?)
• Relationship: customer | vendor | ex-employee | competitor | third-party | other

3. Triggering event

• What happened and when (dates matter — statute-of-limitations, notice periods)
• Evidence available (contracts, emails, records, witnesses)

*Seed doc opportunity: "If you can share the underlying contract, correspondence, or evidence, the draft will be materially sharper. Paths work."*

4. Legal / contractual basis

• Which provisions — specific contract sections if applicable
• Governing law (jurisdiction, choice-of-law clause)
• Statutes or rules relied on (placeholders OK — the draft will flag [CITE:___] anyway)

5. Desired outcome

• Specific asks. Not "resolution" — payment of $X by date Y; cessation of specific activity Z; cure within N days; return of specific property.
• If multiple asks, order them (primary vs. fallback)

6. Deadlines

• External deadline driving this (SoL, ongoing harm window, business event)
• Demand compliance deadline — how long we give the recipient. Use the response window captured in ## Posture for this matter above; do not fall back to a practice-level default.

7. Prior outreach

• Has this been raised informally? When, by whom, in what form?
• Any response so far?
• Why is escalation to a demand letter happening now?

8. Distribution

• Delivery method (ask; no practice-level default)
• Signer — captured in ## Posture for this matter above
• Copies — internal stakeholders, insurance carrier (if tendering pre-demand per practice-level tender-timing rule), counsel

Strategic — asked if material, or if --full

Materiality heuristic: ask the strategic block if any of the following are true.

• Demand type is cease-desist, breach-cure, employment-separation, or preservation
• Desired outcome dollar value ≥ the medium-severity band from ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md risk calibration
• Counterparty is a customer, competitor, or frequent adversary per ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md landscape
• User ran with --full

Explicit skip option. When the strategic block is triggered, the user can decline to answer it. Ask plainly:

> This is a material demand by the heuristic. The strategic block (leverage, BATNA, tone, privilege filters) is where most of the pre-writing value lives. Skipping it produces a thinner draft.

> - Answer now — walk the strategic block (5-7 min)

> - Answer partial — walk the subset you feel prepared for

> - Skip — proceed to draft with only the core block; I'll flag strategic_block: skipped in the intake

If the user chooses Skip, the intake file records it:

strategic_block: skipped        # answered | partial | skipped
skipped_reason: string | null   # captured if user provided one

The draft skill honors the skip — pre-draft gate runs regardless, but sections that depend on strategic-block answers get [SME VERIFY: leverage/tone/privilege not captured in intake] markers. The /demand-draft command also prompts a second time, asking whether the user wants to complete the strategic block before drafting.

9. Leverage and BATNA

• What gives us negotiating power (contractual rights, factual leverage, reputational, commercial)
• What if they refuse — are we prepared to litigate? Go public? Accept a smaller outcome?
• Their likely BATNA — what's their best alternative? (If they don't think we'll sue, the demand is weak.)

10. Downside tolerance

• Reputational exposure if this becomes public
• Precedent risk — does this letter set a pattern that affects other matters?
• Regulatory / disclosure implications (is this the kind of dispute that becomes a 10-Q item?)
• Insurance implications — does sending without tendering waive coverage?

11. Tone posture

• Already captured in ## Posture for this matter above. Here, probe the trade-off if the user chose a stronger tone than the facts seem to warrant, or a weaker tone than the facts seem to warrant.
• Worth naming explicitly: aggressive tone burns the relationship. If you want to keep the business relationship but need to protect the legal position, measured is usually the right call.

12. Settlement-communication posture

• Research the settlement-communication protections applicable in the forum (FRE 408 in federal, the state equivalent otherwise). Is this letter a settlement communication that should be protected? Or an assertion of rights that shouldn't be?
• If protected: the draft will include the settlement-communication marker and will be structured so the substance (a discussion of compromise) — not just the label — supports the posture.
• Protection attaches from conduct and context, not merely from labeling. The marker is a belt-and-suspenders choice.

13. Privilege filters

• What's in our internal analysis that must NOT appear in the letter? (Facts we haven't verified, our doubts about our case, strategic reasoning, prior settlement discussions)
• A single badly-worded sentence can waive privilege on related analysis. Be explicit about what stays out.

14. Admission and accord-and-satisfaction risk

• Anything in the letter that the counterparty could later characterize as an admission of fact or liability?
• Does this demand risk inadvertently satisfying (or purporting to accept) a separate claim? (Accord-and-satisfaction: cashing a check marked "payment in full" can end a disputed debt.)

Writing the intake

Slug

[type]-[counterparty-short]-[yyyy-mm]. Confirm uniqueness in ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/.

~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/[slug]/intake.md

[WORK-PRODUCT HEADER — per plugin config ## Outputs — differs by role; see `## Who's using this`]

# Demand Intake: [title]

**Slug:** [slug]
**Demand type:** [type]
**Drafted by:** [counsel]
**Opened:** [YYYY-MM-DD]
**Status:** intake | ready-to-draft | drafted | sent | closed
**Strategic block:** answered | partial | skipped
**Skipped reason:** [if applicable]

---

## Posture

- **Tone:** [measured / assertive / aggressive — with one-line rationale tied to the relationship and the amount]
- **Response window:** [N days — tied to the claim / contract / protocol]
- **Marking:** [none / without prejudice / without prejudice save as to costs / other — with rationale]
- **Signer:** [name / role — you / client / GC / instructed counsel]

*This is the per-matter posture captured at intake. The draft skill reads from here.*

---

## Parties

- **Sender:** [our entity]
- **Recipient:** [counterparty, entity, address]
- **Recipient audience:** [who reads]
- **Relationship:** [type]

## Triggering event

[What happened, when, evidence]

## Legal / contractual basis

[Provisions, governing law, statutes]

## Desired outcome

[Specific asks in priority order]

## Deadlines

- **External:** [SoL, ongoing harm window]
- **Compliance:** [how long we give them]

## Prior outreach

[History, most recent first]

## Distribution

- **Delivery:** [method]
- **Signer:** [name/role]
- **Copies:** [list]

---

## Strategic (if applicable)

### Leverage & BATNA

[Our power, their likely response]

### Downside tolerance

[Reputational, precedent, regulatory, insurance]

### Tone posture

[relationship-preserving / measured / scorched-earth — with rationale]

### Settlement-communication posture

[Protected or not in the forum — with reasoning. Cite primary source per the applicable rule (FRE 408 or state equivalent).]

### Privilege filters

[What CANNOT appear in the draft]

### Admission / accord-and-satisfaction risk

[Specific risks flagged]

---

## Seed documents

| Doc | Path |
|---|---|
| [underlying contract] | [path or "not shared"] |
| [prior correspondence] | [path or "not shared"] |
| [evidence] | [path or "not shared"] |

---

## Materiality assessment

**Auto-heuristic says:** [material / immaterial — with reasoning]
**User call:** [material / immaterial / TBD at post-send]

Confirm before writing

Show the user the draft intake. Flag anything thin:

> Here's the intake. I notice [thin spots]. Before I save, anything to add?

Handoff to drafting

End with:

> Intake saved. When ready: /litigation-legal:demand-draft [slug]

Close with the next-steps decision tree

End with the next-steps decision tree per CLAUDE.md ## Outputs. Customize the options to what this skill just produced — the five default branches (draft the X, escalate, get more facts, watch and wait, something else) are a starting point, not a lock-in. The tree is the output; the lawyer picks.

What this skill does not do

• Draft the letter. That's demand-draft — the two steps are intentionally separate so counsel can pause for business input, outside counsel consult, or insurance tender before drafting.
• Decide whether to send the letter. Some intake sessions end with "actually, don't send — let's negotiate directly." That's a valid outcome; the intake record still has value.
• Run the conflicts check. If the counterparty is a customer or known entity, flag that this should clear conflicts (per ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md) before sending — but the check itself lives in the matter-intake workflow or outside this skill.