Contracts

Contracts keeps every agreement the business makes in one place: the booth renter's agreement, the lease on a piece of equipment, a salon's wholesale agreement, a supplier's supply agreement, a confidentiality agreement with a photographer. Each is drawn from a template or brought in as a PDF, attached to the records it is about, signed by each side (the other side at a private link on their phone or computer, the business here in the app), kept as a signed PDF, and watched until it renews or ends. It sits just above Admin in the menu. Switch it on under Settings, Menu (or Admin, Modules).

Contracts has two tabs: Contracts (the list, and each contract's own page) and Templates (your own templates, and the app's starters to begin from).

Who sees and signs them

Two switches on a login decide it, under Settings, Team, Logins:

• Contracts shows the section and lets someone draft contracts, add their parties, papers and new versions, and say who looks after each. It is on for owners and admins.
• Sign and send contracts lets someone sign for the business, send a contract out for signature, and renew it, give notice on it or end it; recording an uploaded contract as already signed takes it too. It starts off for everyone but an owner, so turn it on for whoever signs.

Drawing up a contract

1. Open Contracts and choose New contract.
2. Choose where it starts from: From One of Your Templates, From one of the app's starters, A blank page, or Upload a PDF for a contract written elsewhere (see below).
3. Pick Who it is with: an account in the CRM, a wholesale account, a vendor, a client or a person, or someone on the team (a booth renter, say). The title is filled in for you, the template's name with theirs ("Booth rental agreement with" and the renter's name); change it if you like. Say the day it starts, and the place it is about if it is about one: a location, or a property.
4. Choose Draft the contract. It opens as a draft at version 1, numbered for the business, with its end, notice and renewal as the template says. Nothing goes out until you send it.

The app's starters are a booth rental agreement, an equipment lease, a wholesale agreement, a supply agreement, a mutual confidentiality agreement (NDA), a services agreement and a creator agreement, which Creators draws up for each creator from their record (see Creators: codes, links and what they are owed). The first contract drawn from a starter keeps it as one of your templates, to change as you like. A starter is a place to begin in plain words, not legal advice: have whoever advises the business read your version before you rely on it.

On the draft's page you fill in the rest:

• Terms: when it starts and ends (or that it runs until someone ends it), the days of notice it needs, whether it renews by itself and for how many months each time, its value and what the value is for (in all, a week, a month, a quarter or a year), and how it is paid.
• Parties: everyone it is with besides the business, each named as the contract names them, with what the contract calls them (Renter, Lessor, Supplier) and who signs for them, with their title and email. A contract can have several.
• Fill In: the template's own fields, such as the deposit or the rent day. What is still blank is marked in the document, and a contract is not sent while a field it needs is empty.
• The document: the contract as it will read, every field filled in from the contract. Change the words to edit it. A line starting "# " is its title, "## " a heading, "1. " a numbered clause and "- " an item; what is in double braces is filled in from the contract (tap one in the list to put it where the cursor is).

Bringing in a contract signed elsewhere

Choose New contract, Upload a PDF (up to 6 MB). Give it a title, its kind and who it is with, then:

• Tick It is signed already, elsewhere to keep it as signed, with the day it was signed and the dates, notice, renewal and value typed from it. It is reminded about like the rest. The dates stay correctable afterwards, under Terms, Correct, since they were typed by hand; each correction is said in its history.
• Leave it unticked to send it for signature here: the PDF goes out as it is, with a signature page added after its own pages.

Sending it for signature

Choose Send for signature on the contract's page.

1. Who signs for the business: someone whose login includes signing contracts. They sign here, in the app.
2. Who signs for each party: their name, and How they get it: By email, through the app's own sending, or I hand them the link, to send it however you like. Each link is the signer's alone and works for 30 days.
3. How it is signed: All at once (everyone gets it now and signs when they are ready) or In order (each signs once the one before has; tick The business signs first to sign before the others).
4. Add a note for the email if you like, and choose Send for signature.

What it says is then kept exactly as it is, with a fingerprint, and read-only from there on. The Signing card shows each signer and how they stand: waiting for their turn, sent, opened, signed or declined. From it you can Copy their link, Remind them (by email again, or by keeping a handed-over link open another 30 days) and Withdraw from signature, which stops every link.

When it is the business's turn, the person signing for it sees Sign for the business on the contract and a to-do in the To-do list: they type their name and sign with a finger, a pen or the mouse.

What the other side sees

Their link opens the contract in your business's colors and language: its number, who it is between, its dates, renewal and value, every word of it (or the PDF, for one brought in), and who signs and how each stands. They can download it as a PDF to read first. To sign, they type their full name, draw their signature, and tick that they agree to sign electronically; their name, the day and time, and the address they signed from are kept with their signature. Or they choose I do not want to sign it and say why: the version stops for everyone, the business is told with a to-do, and you make a new version with what they asked for, or end it.

When the last signature is in, the contract is in force: Active from its first day (or Signed, not started until then). The signed PDF is drawn once, kept with the contract and its fingerprint, and can be downloaded by the team and at each signer's link.

Versions

A version that was sent is never changed. To change a contract after that, choose Make a new version under Versions, say what changes, edit it and send it again (for a contract brought in as a PDF, upload the new PDF). A signed contract stays in force on its signed version until the new one is signed in its place. The Versions card lists every version with when it was made, sent, signed, declined or withdrawn, and each one's PDF.

Renewals, notice and ending

Each contract with an end is watched by the app's daily clock:

• Two weeks before its notice date (its end, less its days of notice) and again on that date, whoever looks after it gets a reminder: an email when the app's email is on and they have an address, otherwise a to-do. A contract within that window shows as Ending soon.
• One that renews by itself renews at the end of its term, for its renewal's months, says so in its history and tells whoever looks after it. One that does not renew ends at the end of its term.

On the contract's page you can also:

• Renew it for another term, by hand, for the months you choose.
• Record Notice given, by you or by the other side, in writing: one that renews by itself then ends at the end of its term instead, and one that runs until someone ends it ends its notice's days later.
• End it: It ended (at its end, or by both sides agreeing) or It was terminated (ended early by one side, saying why). It stays on record under Ended, with its versions, papers and history.

The reminders and other lines a contract leaves in the To-do list close themselves once they are done: a signature given, a decline answered with a new version, a reminder acted on.

Papers, notes and history

• Papers keeps the contract as it was brought in, every signed PDF, and anything you attach: a schedule, an exhibit, a certificate of insurance (a PDF, or a picture as PNG or JPEG, up to 6 MB).
• Kept by the Business holds who looks after it (they get its reminders; nobody in particular means the owner does), the place it is about, and a note that never appears on the contract itself.
• History lists everything that happened to it, with who did it and when.

A draft never sent can be removed; one that went out or was signed is kept on record and ended instead.

Finding contracts

The list filters by where each stands (Open, Drafts, Out for signature, Ending soon, Ended, All), its kind, When it ends (in the next 30 or 90 days, the next 12 months, or between two days, soonest first), who looks after it, and a party or a place. Search by number, title or who it is with.

The records a contract is attached to show it too: a client's page, someone on the team's page, a vendor's page, a wholesale account and an account in the CRM each have a Contracts card listing theirs, with New contract to draw one up with them.

Templates

Under Templates, write a contract once and draw every one like it from it: its name and kind, its document (with the fields the app fills in from each contract, such as the parties, the dates and the value), its own fields that only it asks for (a line of words, a paragraph, an amount of money, a date or a number, each required or not, with a hint for whoever fills it in), and what a contract drawn from it starts with: how long it runs, its days of notice, whether it renews by itself, how its value is counted and how it is signed. Read it laid out shows it as a signer will read it.

Saving a change to what a template says makes its next version; contracts drawn from it before keep their words. A template contracts were drawn from is put away rather than removed: it is no longer offered, and its contracts keep their text.

The app's starters are written in English. A business that works in another language writes its own templates in it; everything else on a contract, and the page a signer signs at, speaks the business's language.

Programs and the assistant

Programs reach contracts through a part of their own in the API (Settings, Connections), given to a key on purpose: reading them, drafting them, their parties, versions, papers and templates, and sending, reminding, withdrawing, renewing, giving notice and ending. Under Settings, Approvals, sending, reminders, withdrawing, renewing, notice and ending ask first when AI asks for them, and programs may too if you say so. A key acts within the switches of the login that made it, so a key whose maker cannot sign contracts cannot send them. Four events tell your other tools what happened: contract.sent, contract.signed, contract.renewing and contract.ended.

The assistant can answer questions about contracts ("which contracts end this quarter?", "is the equipment lease signed?") for someone whose login includes contracts. Neither a program nor the assistant ever sees a signer's link or a drawn signature, and neither ever signs.

A demo business never emails anyone: send its contracts with I hand them the link.

Best practices

• Write each kind of agreement once, as a template, and draw every contract like it from it: the dates, value and parties fill themselves in, and nothing is retyped.
• Bring in the contracts you already have, signed on paper, with their dates and notice typed carefully from them: then they are reminded about like the rest.
• Say who looks after each contract. Its reminders go to them; with nobody named, they go to the owner.
• Set the days of notice the contract really says. The first reminder comes two weeks before the notice date, which is the last day to say you will not renew.
• Keep Sign and send contracts to the few people who may bind the business, and hand each link only to the person it is for.
• Attach what goes with a contract (a schedule, a certificate of insurance) to it, so it is all in one place when the contract is renewed or ended.

Questions people ask

Can I change a contract after it was signed? Make a new version under Versions. The signed version stays in force until the new one is signed.

The other side asked for a change before signing. If they declined, make a new version with the change and send it. If they have not, withdraw it from signature, make the change in a new version and send that.

It renewed by itself and we did not want it to. Record the notice that was given (Notice given), or end it under End it; to avoid it next time, give notice before its notice date, which its reminders tell you.

Do signers need an account? No. Their private link is all they need, on a phone or a computer.

Is a signature here legally binding? Each signer agrees to sign electronically, and their name, the time and the address they signed from are kept with their signature on the signed PDF. Whether that suits a particular agreement is a question for whoever advises the business.