Organize and rename contract PDFs

Every contract folder holds the same three files: contract_final.pdf, contract_final_v2.pdf and contract_final_v3.pdf. Which of them is the signed one is known only to whoever opens it. Filery Rename reads the parties, the contract type and the date out of the document and turns those version stamps into filenames that show counterparty and edition without a single click. What applies stays legible years later.

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Before & After

Vertrag_final_v3.pdf 2024-06-01_Muster-GmbH_NDA.pdf

Where the usable fields sit inside a contract

A contract is built differently from an accounting document. The parties appear in the preamble at the very top of page one, usually in a between A and B form, with full company name, legal form and registered seat. The contract type is in the heading above it: non-disclosure agreement, framework agreement, works contract, services agreement. The date, by contrast, is almost never at the top but at the back in the signature block, often twice, because the two sides signed on different days. Filery therefore evaluates the whole document text rather than only the first page. What is usable for the name is the counterparty — your own company appears on every contract and contributes nothing to telling them apart.

Why Vertrag_final_v3.pdf becomes 2024-06-01_Muster-GmbH_NDA.pdf

The suffix final says nothing, because every final version is followed by another one, and v3 only means something relative to v1 and v2 sitting in the same folder. The pattern Date_Party_ContractType carries three pieces of information that will still be true in five years. Muster-GmbH is the counterparty from the preamble, NDA the common short form for the non-disclosure agreement, the date is the edition from which this version applies. Legal forms such as GmbH stay in the name, because Muster GmbH and Muster AG may well be different companies in the same group. Filery replaces dots and ampersands in company names so the results work equally on Windows and macOS.

Signature, effectiveness, term start — three different dates

Contracts regularly carry more than one date: the day of the last signature, a differing effective date and sometimes a retroactive start of term. For filing, the start of effectiveness has proven itself, because that is what people search by when someone asks which version applied in June. If the document shows only one date, Filery takes it. If it shows several, you see the choice in the preview and decide. Drafts have no date at all — the field then stays empty and the name begins with party and contract type, which reliably separates the draft from the signed version.

Amendments, variation agreements and terminations

A contract rarely stays alone. After a few years it is flanked by two amendments, a price adjustment and eventually the termination. For those documents to stay together in the folder, they should carry the same naming stem of party and contract type and differ only in the type field: amendment-1, variation, termination. Sorting then follows the date automatically. Amendments often name the counterparty only in shortened form or point back to the original through a contract date — that is the moment when a look at the preview pays off, because otherwise the suggestion hangs on an incomplete preamble.

Preview, history and where the contract text goes

With contracts, reviewing matters more than with receipts, because a misassigned counterparty gets expensive in a dispute. Filery therefore places every suggestion next to the existing name and renames only after your confirmation; the rename history in the app records what the file was called before. Technically the app reads the PDF on your device and transmits the content encrypted for AI analysis. Only the recognised fields come back, the renaming happens on the device again, and the contract files themselves are not stored permanently. For law firms and audit departments that want to run the analysis under their own agreement with their AI provider, there is the Custom plan with your own API keys.

FAQ

Yes, when OCR is switched on. The signature itself is not read, and it does not need to be — preamble and heading are printed and therefore recognisable. Dates entered by hand in the signature block do remain a weak spot and should be checked in the preview.

Bilingual contracts usually place the two versions side by side in columns or append the translation at the back. Parties and contract type then appear twice but with identical substance. Recognition works from content, so both columns lead to the same result.

That is decided by your own data protection and professional conduct review, not by the app. What matters for that review: the document content is transmitted encrypted for analysis. Anyone who wants to keep processing entirely within their own contractual relationship uses the Custom plan with their own API keys.

Yes, you select the folder and work through the suggestions as a batch. With legacy holdings, a test run on a few files is advisable to tune the naming pattern before several hundred contracts get a new name. Nothing is renamed until you confirm it.

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System requirements: macOS 10.14+, Windows 10/11

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