Dead Phrases: The set of words or phrases which have little or no meaning at all are called dead phrases.
Example 1:
As a matter of fact, all except one member agreed with my suggestions.
"As a matter of fact" is dead phrases, as you could have concisely conveyed the same message by saying "All except one member agreed with my suggestions."
Example 2:
He achieved success only by means of hard work.
"means of" is dead phrase in this sentence - you could have concisely conveyed the same message by saying, "He achieved success only by hard work."
Some other common examples of dead phrases may be;
as far as I'm concerned, by virtue of the fact that, in a very real sense, as a matter of fact.
Explanation:
There are no dead phrases in absolute sense. They are relative to the context i.e in one context they may be dead phrases, while in some other context they may be required. The dead phrases in above examples are dead only when taken with that context.
Rewriting the Roundabout Expressions:
for the period of one year ---> for one year
at this very present ---> at present/now
due to the fact that ----> because
during the exact time that ---> then/at that time
