Production QC

This technical note discusses quality control (QC) steps for a production.  A production is an automated process and if a failure occurs due to document corruption or other issues, the Lexbe eDiscovery Platform (LEP) does not and often cannot capture the error.  Human review for systematic problems is always advisable.

QC a Standard Production (PDF and Native)

1. Once the production is completed, from the Discovery>Production Job page select a production job by title, click "Download Production" to download locally to check files.

2. Compare the number of "Docs Produced" on the Production page with the number of documents in the production PDF folder (right click on the PDF folder and choose "Properties" to check folder properties).

3. Compare the Produced Range (Bates) with the range of files in the PDF folder.

4. Spot check the PDFs to see if continuous (no gaps). For this step, users can generally "eyeball" the titles of the PDFs, which will reflect the starting Bates numbers assigned. 

5. Open selected PDFs to confirm that the Bates number is properly embossed, quality is good, and the file name Bates matches the embossed Bates. It is recommended to choose files from the beginning of the production, middle of the production, and end of the production to ensure the Bates numbers are consistent and complete. It is best practice to examine roughly 10% of the total documents produced. 

6. If there is Attorney Eyes Only or other special designations, spot check those. Filter on the Production in LEP, and then filter on "Confidential" and/or "Custom Designation." Use the filtered results to compare Bates number in LEP to Bates number in the PDF production folder to ensure the documents that should have designations do contain them on the pages.

7. Spot check the ORIGINALS folder.  It should contain native files with Bates names as the titles, but the number may be lower. It is good practice to check that if Native emails were not to be produced (which is the default and recommended way to produce .msg files) That the documents that were in LEP as Native emails have a PDF version without a bates stamp in the Originals Folder.  It is also recommended that if the production included REDACTED documents, to check the REDACTED folder and confirm that the Redacted version is in the Originals folder as well as in the REDACTED folder. 

8. Spot check the Text folder and this should contain the same number of documents produced with a continuous Bates range. This number should be the same as the PDF folder count.

9. Open the Excel load file (LOADFILES>VOL001.lexbeloadfile.xlsx) in Excel and compare number of rows with documents produced, the Bates range, and any other desired fields.

10. Select a random document (row) in the Excel and open the PDF and TXT versions to see if metadata, Bates, etc. matches.  Do this for multiple documents, if needed.

11. Open selected text documents and see if the text is of good quality and matches the PDF version sufficiently.

QC a TIFF Production

1. Follow the same steps as for the Standard Production above.

2. The Images folder count should match the Produced Bates Range in pages.

3. Open selected TIFF images to confirm that the Bates number is properly embossed, quality is good, and the file name Bates matches the embossed Bates.

4. Compare selected TIFF images with text in the corresponding text file.

Privileged/Work Product

1. Documents coded privileged or work product should not be in the downloaded production. Look at the Withheld Range on the Discovery> Production Job page in LEP.  This range follows the production range.  Confirm that no Bates numbers from the Withheld Range are in the PDF, TEXT, IMAGES or ORIGINALS folders.

2. If there is privileged text or terms that should not be in the Production, search in the TEXT folder and PDF folder, either in selected documents or in the entire folder if computer resources permit, for the text that should have caused a document to be coded privileged.

Redacted Documents

1. If Redacted documents are in the production, identify selected ones (filter in Browse on the Production and Redacted>Show Redacted Only).  View the redaction in the Document viewer.  Confirm in the downloaded Production that the redacted version is in the Production (PDF, IMAGES and TEXT folders), and there is only the redacted document in the corresponding ORIGINALS folder.

2. If there is redacted text that should have been removed, search in the TEXT folder and PDF folder, either in selected documents or in the entire folder if computer resources permit, for the text that should have been redacted.

Tracking Production Fields in Excel

From the Discovery>Production Job page, click the link All Productions. 

This opens the Production>Single Productions page.

From this page the user may select productions by title and export to an Excel spreadsheet all production fields (Title, Comments, Created By, Run By, Date Time Created, Date Time Created, etc.). After exporting the log to an Excel spreadsheet, QC the fields and compare the Produced Range (Bates) with the range of files in the PDF folder:

Alternate Procedures

The above are suggestions and depend on many factors including case size, importance, review quality, staffing, review methodology, and time available.  Contact Professional Services for additional consultation.