◉The Clock Desk Open the partner account
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The Clock Desk / Read the clock
A reading routine

How to read the time clauses

Every set of terms has a clock section, and it is usually spread across the document rather than gathered in one place. Eight clauses carry almost all of it, and each has a recognisable good form and a recognisable silent form.

Open the partner accountRead the time clauses
Account spec
Clauses to find
8
Zones named on sample G
9 of 40 pages
Counting stated
2 of 40 pages
Conversions needed
1 per clause
the boundaryThe instant the account's day is measured from. On the samples it is 00:00 UTC, which is a different wall-clock moment for every reader.
the countdownWhat a window is measured from and whether day one counts. A window advertised as 30 days delivers 29 days 23 hours 59 minutes on the sample.
the calendarThe working-day clock money moves on, with its cut-off, its weekends and its holidays. One working day covered 87 hours 30 minutes on the sample.
Direct answerFind the zone first, then the counting convention, then the cut-off. A time clause that names no zone cannot be acted on, and on the sample only 9 of 40 pages name one. The single conversion that makes a clause usable is from the operator's zone into your own wall clock.

The eight clauses

clause 01
The dayA good form names the zone and the boundary: "each day runs from 00:00 to 00:00 UTC". The silent form says "daily" and leaves both to be inferred, which is what 31 of the 40 sample pages do.
clause 02
The resetA good form names the boundary and what returns to it: a full amount, a graduated amount, or nothing until a condition is met. The silent form says the limit "resets daily" without saying to what.
clause 03
The countdownA good form says what starts it, whether day one counts and whether anything pauses it: "within 30 days of the credit, the day of the credit included, with no suspension". The silent form gives the length alone.
clause 04
The cut-offA good form gives an instant, a zone and what it is a property of: "this market closes at 15:00:00 UTC". The silent form says the market closes "at the start", which makes the line depend on an event rather than a clock.
clause 05
The counting unitA good form distinguishes working days from calendar days and says which calendar applies. The silent form says "within one working day" without naming the country whose holidays count.
clause 06
The stored clockA good form says which zone a record is written in. On the sample, no page does, which is the single largest gap the desk found.
clause 07
The change of hourA good form says what happens to a window across a daylight-saving change. On the sample, no page mentions it at all, and one account day a year measures 25 wall-clock hours.
clause 08
The word for laterA good form replaces "shortly" and "as soon as possible" with a number and a clock. On the sample, 5 of 40 pages use a vague word for a time they could have stated.
The one conversion, done once per clausestated: "closes at 16:00 UTC" your offset: UTC+13 local: 16:00 + 13 h = 05:00 the following day stated: "claims open at 00:00 UTC on Monday" your offset: UTC+13 local: 13:00 on Monday, and the window runs into Tuesday stated: "within 30 days, day of credit included" credit: 1 March 00:00 UTC local deadline, UTC+13: 31 March 12:59:59 local deadline, UTC-8: 30 March 15:59:59 three clauses, three conversions, three different local dates
  1. Search the document for a zone. The words UTC, GMT and any offset are the cheapest thing to look for, and their absence is itself the answer.
  2. Find the counting convention. Look for the words within, from, after and including, and for working alongside days.
  3. Find the cut-off or the boundary. Every clause in the list above has one, and it is written either as an instant or as a description of an event.
  4. Convert once, and write the result next to the clause. A converted clause is a note you can act on; an unconverted one is a sentence.
  5. Check for the two silences. A stored clock and a daylight-saving change are the two clauses the sample's pages almost never write, and they are the two that move a deadline by an hour or by a day.
  6. Keep the record. Where the document is silent, the transaction record is the only other source, and it carries the operator's own timestamp.
Which day the account keepsthe first clause The countdown on a creditthe third clause Whose midnightthe conversion itself Every figure in one placewith the arithmetic behind it