Product Thinking
Confidence Without Certainty: Designing Outputs Lawyers Can Actually Use
A probability score is a bad interface for professional judgement. A reasoned confidence band, with its inputs shown, is a much better one.
Show a solicitor a bare percentage and one of two things happens. Either they discount it entirely as marketing dressed as maths, or — more dangerously — they anchor to it. Neither serves the underlying decision.
The problem with the score
A single number smooths over exactly the information a professional needs: which inputs drove the estimate, how sensitive it is to a change in facts, and where the underlying data is thin. A number without those things is not an interface, it is a claim.
The output has to be legible to challenge, not just to consumption.
What replaces it
A qualitative band — with the reasoning, the authorities, and the coverage limits set out — invites the user to test the estimate rather than accept it. That is the point. The lawyer is the decision-maker; the output is there to be argued with.
See how this works in practice
Probatur outputs are not legal advice and are intended for case preparation only.