without prejudice
phrase · unbeschadet
Two phrases share one skin. Without prejudice to a right is unbeschadet, and the machine usually gets that right. Without prejudice on a settlement letter is an evidentiary privilege, and German law has no equivalent, ohne Präjudiz is a gesture, not a shield.
Which translation, when
Why
The English label does real work, communications made in a genuine attempt to settle are privileged and cannot be put before the court, the words on the letterhead invoke a rule of evidence. German procedure knows no general settlement privilege, what is said in negotiations can as a rule be used in the later lawsuit, and the customary German formulas, ohne Präjudiz, ohne Anerkennung einer Rechtspflicht, manage expectations without excluding evidence. Protection exists only in pockets, by agreement between the parties, and in mediation, where § 4 MediationsG binds the mediator, not the parties’ own letters. So the phrase must be translated by function, unbeschadet where a right is being preserved, and where the privilege is meant, the German reader needs the warning that it does not exist, not a two-word token that pretends it does.
Typical mistakes
- Ohne Vorurteil is the literal rendering and pure nonsense in a legal text, prejudice here is legal detriment, not bias.
- Unbeschadet on a settlement letter misfires, it preserves rights against a document, it says nothing about admissibility.
- Ohne Präjudiz comforts an English client into thinking the letter is off the record, in a German proceeding it is not, absent a confidentiality agreement the court may see it.
What matters
Settlement correspondence across the Channel is the live case: the English solicitor heads the offer without prejudice and believes it can never surface in court, the German recipient reads ohne Präjudiz as politeness. If the case lands before a German judge the letter is not shielded, and the client who admitted weakness in it finds his own words in the file.
What the machine misses
Put a settlement letter through an engine and without prejudice arrives as ohne Vorurteil or, on a better day, unbeschadet, one output is gibberish and the other preserves rights nobody was discussing. The privilege the English writer relied on is a rule of evidence, not a phrase, and no wording the machine can choose will carry it into a German courtroom.
Examples
| without prejudice to clause 12 | unbeschadet der Ziffer 12 |
| without prejudice to any other rights | unbeschadet sonstiger Rechte |
| a without prejudice offer | ein Vergleichsangebot ohne Anerkennung einer Rechtspflicht |
| without prejudice negotiations | Vergleichsverhandlungen ohne Präjudiz |