Your ops lead just told you a summer intern starts in seventeen days, and nobody has drafted her contract yet. The cheapest way to write an intern contract with AI is a clause-assembly drafter built into a document platform, priced on a flat monthly tier rather than charged per document. It produces a complete, paid, fixed-term draft in minutes, and a solicitor review is still worth the spend if anything about the placement is unusual. This guide walks through the real costs of every route, why "AI drafting" means two very different things depending on the tool, and how to get from a blank calendar slot to a signed contract without losing a week to it.
> Quick answer: A clause-assembly drafter inside a document platform is the cheapest reliable way to draft an intern contract with AI. It costs a published flat monthly fee rather than a per-document charge, and it builds the draft from vetted clauses rather than generating wording from scratch. A general-purpose chatbot is faster to open but cannot tell you what it left out. For a routine, low-risk placement, the assembled draft is usually enough on its own. For anything unusual, a quick solicitor check is the sensible next step.
What it actually costs to get an intern contract done
Four routes exist, and they are not equally cheap once you count what happens after the contract is signed, not just before.
| Route | Upfront cost | What you actually get |
|---|---|---|
| Blank page or a generic web template | Free | No pay-status logic, no IP clause, no confidentiality clause. The cost lands later, when a missing clause becomes a dispute. |
| Paid template site | A per-document fee, often £15 to £40 | Static wording that does not adapt to your intern's actual dates, hours or pay. No check against your facts. |
| General-purpose AI chatbot | Free or a subscription unrelated to contracts | Fast, fluent output. It invents the wording as it goes and gives no signal about what it has omitted. |
| Clause-assembly drafter in a document platform | A flat monthly plan, unlimited within your drafting allowance | A complete draft from vetted clauses, matched to your answers, with pay-status and IP handled by default. |
The blank page looks free right up until an intern is treated as unpaid when the law would call them a worker, which is the single most litigated point in intern contracts. Our intern contract template guide covers exactly why status, not the job title, decides whether pay is required. A paid template site charges you for wording that still has not seen your actual facts.
Assembled clauses versus invented wording: the difference that matters here
A general-purpose chatbot writes an intern contract the same way it writes anything else. It predicts, sentence by sentence, the text that is statistically likely to come next. Nobody checked that specific IP clause before it appeared on your screen, and it exists nowhere else in exactly that form. It can look confident and still misstate the pay-status position, because the model has no fixed source of truth behind it.
A clause-assembly drafter works differently. It selects clauses by ID from a library a person has already reviewed, and its job is matching your answers to the right existing wording, not composing new legal text. AI Legal Drafting in 99 Data Rooms works this way. It never invents legal wording. It assembles a draft from vetted clauses, and every clause in the result is one that has already been checked, not freshly generated for you. We cover the broader argument for why that distinction matters in assembled clauses versus invented ones.
For an intern contract specifically, this is not academic. A generic chatbot draft can quietly assume the internship is unpaid because that is a common pattern in its training data, missing the point that pay status turns on the actual work, not the label. A vetted clause set builds the honest pay-status logic in from the start.
From a five-minute questionnaire to a signed contract
Inside the template library, the Intern Agreement sits in the People and Founders group. Describe the placement in plain words, for example an eight-week summer internship, full-time, paid at minimum wage, and the assistant asks the questions that shape the draft: the intern's name, the dates, the hours, the pay rate and the duties.
It assembles a complete draft in a couple of minutes, including confidentiality and IP clauses by default. Read it properly before you send it. Treat the output as a strong starting point rather than a finished contract, especially if the placement is borderline on pay status.
Once you are happy with it, share it with the intern as a tracked, revocable link rather than an email attachment. Gate it behind a verified email and a one-time code, so the person opening it is actually your incoming intern. Page-by-page analytics show whether she opened it and how long she spent on the pay clause, useful context before someone signs their first ever employment paperwork.
When she is ready, send it for signature in the browser. She signs without creating an account, and the executed document returns with an audit certificate recording her IP address, intent to sign, timestamps and a SHA-256 fingerprint. Electronic signatures are admissible for most commercial documents in England and Wales, with exceptions that include deeds and land transfers. This is general information, not legal advice. The signed contract, and the start date it records, then live in the same place as the rest of your hiring paperwork, which is exactly the gap our guide on getting reminded before a contract expires is built to close for fixed-term arrangements like this one.
What to check before you send it
A drafted contract is not the same as a finished one. Before you send it out, check five things: the intern's name and both dates are correct, the pay rate matches the applicable National Minimum Wage band for her age, the hours and any flexibility are stated plainly, the holiday accrual line matches a genuinely paid placement, and the IP clause actually covers the kind of work she will be doing. Get those five right and the rest of the template is doing its job.
Frequently asked questions
Is a clause-assembly drafter actually cheaper than a free chatbot?
Counting only the upfront price, no. Counting the cost of a missing pay-status clause or an absent IP assignment, yes. A flat monthly plan that produces a correct draft every time is cheaper than a free draft you have to fix, or worse, defend, later.
Can I just ask a general AI chatbot to write the intern contract?
You can, but treat the result as an unreviewed first pass at best. It invents the wording on the spot, cannot tell you what it left out, and has no fixed link to a checked source. For a document that turns on a fact-sensitive question like pay status, that is a real gap.
Does the drafter know if my intern must be paid?
It builds the paid, fixed-term structure in by default, because pay status turns on what the intern actually does rather than the job title. It is a strong starting point, not a status determination, so a genuinely borderline placement still deserves a quick check.
How much drafting can I do on the free plan?
Monthly drafting allowance depends on your plan tier. The free plan gives three rooms and twenty-five active links, forever, no card required, enough to gate and share a real intern contract; the AI drafter and e-signature start on Pro at £19 a month.
Is the assembled draft the same as legal advice?
No. It is a starting point built from vetted clauses, not a substitute for a solicitor. This article and the drafted document are both general information, not legal advice, and anything unusual about the placement is worth a professional check.
Draft your intern contract for free
Assemble a paid, fixed-term intern contract from vetted clauses, then gate, track and sign it in the same place. The free tier is real, not a countdown: three rooms and twenty-five active links, forever, no card. Start for free and have a complete draft ready before the summer intake even confirms her start date. If you are hiring for a permanent role instead, our guide on drafting an employment contract with AI covers that flow, and if the role is a genuinely self-employed engagement, see drafting a consultancy agreement with AI.
Sources
- National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage rates: https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates ; employment rights for interns: https://www.gov.uk/employment-rights-for-interns
- Statutory holiday of 5.6 weeks, accrued by workers including interns: https://www.gov.uk/holiday-entitlement-rights ; Working Time Regulations 1998, https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1998/1833
- Electronic signatures, validity and witnessing of deeds in England and Wales: Law Commission, Electronic execution of documents (2019), https://lawcom.gov.uk/project/electronic-execution-of-documents/ ; HM Land Registry Practice Guide 82, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/electronic-signatures-accepted-by-hm-land-registry-pg82