We built this because nothing existed.
Every Portuguese renovation has a non-trivial chance of going wrong. The legal regime is precise — Civil Code arts. 1207–1230 lay out exactly what the homeowner is entitled to, with deadlines, remedies in order, and proof requirements. But almost nobody, including most homeowners, knows that.
The problem
When something goes wrong with a renovation — the contractor disappears with the deposit, defects appear after delivery, the work runs late and never finishes, or the invoice is never issued — the homeowner has roughly four options:
- Write the loss off and live with it (most common).
- Pay a lawyer €50–€300 for a 30-minute consultation that produces an email summary.
- Subscribe to DECO Proteste for €177–€213 a year and get a generic phone line and a generic letter template.
- Try to draft something themselves from a free template they found on a blog and hope it's right.
None of these gets the homeowner what they actually need: a complete file, in the format a Portuguese lawyer recognises immediately, with statute references in every paragraph and a printer-ready notice letter that satisfies the formal requirements of the Civil Code.
That's the gap ClaimPack fills.
Why the expat focus
Foreign owners hit the same legal regime, but with extra friction: language, unfamiliar institutions (Centros de Arbitragem, Julgados de Paz, IMPIC, AT), and a small market of lawyers comfortable working through the case in English. The willingness to pay for a finished, comprehensible deliverable is highest in this segment.
We serve Portuguese homeowners too — the Portuguese version of the site is live at claimpack.pt/pt — but the product was designed first to clear the bar of "the expat in Cascais who doesn't trust their Portuguese to write a registered letter".
How we make decisions
The principles we won't bend on:
- AI never decides legal routing, never computes deadlines, never fills statute citations. Those are deterministic code paths. AI handles structured-data extraction and Portuguese formal-register prose generation. That's it.
- Templates are versioned and dated. Every notice, every routing letter, every section of the case brief carries a
template_version. Under Lei 10/2024, you author the letter on your own behalf using our template, so lawyer review is your call, not a gate. When Portuguese law changes, templates are flagged for review and the version bumped. - Soft deletes only. We never
DROPuser data. RGPD-mandated erasure happens through a controlled deletion workflow. - No public contractor naming. No defamation risk surface. Where the case warrants, the user files with IMPIC, AT, or as a queixa-crime — but our marketing surface never names a specific contractor.
- Free firm message, every time. Diagnostic, workspace, AI chat, and the firm Portuguese message — all free. The €149 pack adds the case file, registered notice, and routing — when you need more.
Who built this
Built by Oskar, who had a renovation go wrong in 2023 and built the product as a tool he wishes had existed. He paid a Portuguese lawyer €500 for a consultation that produced a 1-page email summary; the same case, today, generates a 12-page lawyer-ready file in an afternoon.
ClaimPack is in pre-launch. Under Lei 10/2024, de 19 de janeiro, the acts reserved to advogados apply when exercised on behalf of third parties — you author your own letter using our template, on your own affairs, so a lawyer is not required for you to operate.
What's next
Roadmap, briefly:
- V1 (current) — diagnostic + workspace + free firm message + paid full pack, free organised handoff for off-ramped users.
- V1.5 — partnerships with pre-contract due-diligence services so users are caught earlier in the funnel.
- V2 — coverage for compra-e-venda defects (DL 84/2021) and structural-defect 10-year claims (once the consolidated regime is lawyer-verified — same posture as today's notices).