Start with the workflow you need to prove
A large bank, healthcare organization, or government agency has several buying decisions inside one procurement process. The archive needs to capture the relevant records. Reviewers need to find and assess them. Records and legal teams need a workable production process. Security teams need to understand where the data moves and who can access it.
Evaluate Comma against a representative scenario, with the channels, permissions, volumes, and deployment constraints your organization actually needs.
One evaluation, several accountable teams
Compliance and supervision
Walk through a policy, its review queue, assignment, and the decision on a flagged communication. Test how a finding connects to a case.Legal and records
Find a representative conversation, connect the relevant identities and records, and inspect the proposed collection and export workflow. Confirm enablement and format requirements.Security and infrastructure
Review capture architecture, identity, administrative access, subprocessors, recovery, and residency boundaries for the deployment in scope.Operations and procurement
Confirm connector dependencies, rollout responsibilities, support, commercial scope, migration needs, and acceptance criteria.
Set acceptance criteria before the demonstration
| Area | What to bring | What to inspect |
|---|---|---|
| Channel coverage | The source systems and record types you need | A sample record from each required source, including attachments and available metadata |
| Configuration | Legal entities, groups, jurisdictions, and approval owners | Which settings take effect, which record policy intent, and who can change them |
| Surveillance | Representative policies and review responsibilities | A flagged conversation, queue routing, human review, and case handoff |
| Investigation | A sample matter and identity aliases | Search scope, linked evidence, case ownership, and enabled discovery surfaces |
| Production | Required output formats and expected volumes | A representative delivered package and documented limits or exceptions |
| Residency | Permitted locations and transfers | The full data path, including search, processing, backups, and access |
| Rollout | Users, source permissions, and timing | Availability, prerequisites, pilot scope, and the responsibilities of each party |
Configuration has to mean something precise
Comma’s Configuration Center brings operational controls together. Its legal-baseline and policy surfaces also make it possible to record jurisdictional choices and counsel positions. Some recorded policy choices do not yet drive enforcement. Your evaluation should distinguish a saved policy position from a control that changes system behavior.
The configuration and controls guide explains this boundary so your administrators and counsel can evaluate the same model.
Residency is part of the architecture review
Describe the required location of the archive and the permitted locations for processing, backups, and access. Include source-platform and capture dependencies. Region-specific availability and strict residency requirements need explicit verification for your deployment.
Use the data residency review to structure the discussion.
Private cloud, on-premises and dedicated infrastructure
Bring these requirements into the architecture review. We’ll assess feasibility, service dependencies and operating responsibilities for the environment you need. This is a requirements review, not a promise that every deployment model is available. An additional archive copy in your own storage is separate from hosting the Comma application itself.
Inspect the capture layer
The WhatsApp and Signal capture repositories are public. Security reviewers can inspect those connectors before a commercial decision. Public source code supports that review; your organization still evaluates the complete service and deployment.
See open-source capture and the Trust Center for the available security material.
Compare the same workflow across vendors
If you are evaluating Comma alongside Smarsh, Global Relay, or another provider, use the same sources, review task, export request, and deployment requirements in each demonstration. Ask each provider to identify prerequisites and limits. A channel logo or a feature name is only the beginning of that comparison.
Explore the communications archive, surveillance, e-discovery, meeting recordings, and CRM records and sync.
Planning an enterprise evaluation
Can we evaluate a specific region or data center?
Can we review actual output rather than a slide deck?
Does a CRM connector also archive CRM records?
Evaluate Comma against your operating requirements.
Bring compliance, legal, records, and security into a product and architecture walkthrough.