The Contracts table holds all Contract records, and controls the associated automation and notifications that are related to them. Contract records are an integral part of the Standard System Demo, and hold information the contracting party, approval information, renewal details, attached contract files, and supporting documents. Contracts may be created manually from the Contracts table or converted from Sourcing Events.
Fields that are required when creating Contract records are marked with an asterisk in the image above. Required fields include:
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Contracts, SOWs, and Amendments can all be created from an existing Contract record, whereas Master Agreement records are created manually in the Contract table. The Record Type field in the common area of a Contract record indicates the contract's category. "Contract" is the default Record Type for newly created contracts. It can be used to indicate either a stand-alone contract, or a contract that exists under a Master Agreement. In the latter case, the Parent Contract ID can be filled in upon creation of the contract. SOWs and Amendments are linked to a parent contract automatically if they are created by clicking the Create Related Contract button in the parent Contract record.
Below the Record Type are fields that store the Internal Contract Owner and the Assigned Team. The default Assigned Team is the Contract Management Team. The Internal Contract Owner is the person responsible for overseeing the contract and ensuring timely renewals and approvals. The list of available owners is filtered to users who are in the Contract Owner Team or the Contract Manager Team. The default Internal Contract Owner is the user who creates the Contract record, provided that user is in the Contract Manager or Contract Owner Team. Users in the Contract Manager or Admin group can manually change the Assigned Team and Internal Contract Owner if needed. Information about the contract requester, external company involved, and locations related to the contract may be added by clicking the lookup icon next to those fields. If a desired Requester, Company, or Location does not exist, a record must first be created in order to link it to the Contract.
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In the Contract Party Information section, users can find and link to an existing company, or create new ones as needed. To find an existing Company record, select the Existing Company option and use the lookup icon next to Company Name to search for the company. If the contract party isn't found, power users can add a new company by selecting the New Company option. Enter the name and address information, then click Create Company. Before adding new information, ensure that you check for all possible alternate spellings or stylizations of the desired value.
Both Company and Location records are created in the background, and linked to the new contract when the record refreshes.
Similarly, you can create new entries in the People table if the main contact for the contract party is not an existing contact. Select New Contact, enter the information, and click Create Main Contact. Multiple contacts can be created in this way, and then the primary contact can be selected from the Main Contact drop-down.
When contract requesters submit a new contract, they can enter a new company and contact information, but they cannot see the buttons to create new records due to their permissions. When a contract is submitted for review, contract managers can edit the contract party information, or click the button to confirm the new company or contact to finish adding records.
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Print Template to Generate has a default set of values that are based on the Contract Type, and there may be some visibility dependent fields that appear based on whether the print template uses user-selected or optional clauses. For instance, the Customer Service Contract default template has some additional fields such as 'Select Governing Law Clause' and 'Select Optional Clauses:'
The Create and Attach action button is used to auto-generate a contract document from the MS Word print template specified in the Print Template to Generate field, which is then stored in the Print Template File field. Clicking Create and Attach generates the document and creates an Attachment record to hold the attached file. If there are clauses associated with the selected Print Template, the Contract Clauses will populate with the clause text used in this Contract. As updates are made to the clauses, the Contract Clause text will be updated.
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Attachments can be automatically generated from inbound emails that contain attached files. Files from inbound emails are mapped to the Transitional Contract Files field in the Contract record, assigned a predetermined Attachment Title and Attachment Type value of 'Document Provided by Outside Party,' and then converted into a new Attachment record. The file is mapped into the Attached File field in the Attachment record. If multiple files are attached to an inbound email, each one is converted into a separate Attachment record for that contract.
Attachments Tab
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To add files from a local source, drag and drop the file(s) from your computer onto the "Drag&Drop files" square. Alternatively, click the "Attach/Manage" text and choose "Local Source" to navigate to the file(s) to upload.
If an Attachment Type is defined, the default settings for the selected Attachment Type will be applied regarding permission level, approvals, and e-signature.
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- Add or Remove for the Approval Packet: sets the Include in Approval Packet field to Yes or No.
- Add or Remove for the E-sign Packet: changes the To Be eSigned field to Yes or No.
- Set Status to Superseded: sets the Status for the selected attachments to Superseded.
- Convert to Word/PDF: converts a Word document to a PDF or a PDF to a Word document and saves the conversion as a separate document, but does not supersede the original.
When an attached .docx file is edited using Edit and Checkout, the revised file automatically creates a revision record. The revision is then immediately compared to its baseline, which is the template attachment that was originally generated. A redlined document can be located within the attachment record. Redlines on Contract Clauses appear automatically.
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This table stores all the Clauses used in a Contract. Contract Clauses are populated automatically when the Print Template is created. When revisions are compared against the baseline, the Contract Clauses update to show the redlines against the source text. The Contract Clauses are sorted in the order they appear in the print template when the source is Print Template. If the Contract Clause is changed from the source, Modified from Default changes to Yes. For more information on Contract Clauses, see the Contract Clause Table.
Tracking Company Documents and Insurance Certificates
The Attachments tab also holds tables of Company Document and Insurance Certificate records. The Create New Company Document button opens a new Company Document record that is linked to this Contract record.
For more information on company documents, see the Company Documents Table section.
Insurance certificates can be found directly in the Insurance Coverages table, and in related tables in the Company, Contracts, and Company Documents tables.
When you add an insurance certificate to a Company record, it can be automatically linked to all pending or active contracts with that vendor by a time-based rule that runs daily. However, this time-based rule is disabled by default in the Standard System Demo.
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- Select the correct Workflow Title from the drop-down list.
- Click Create Approvals. This generates a set of related Approval records in a Status of Queued.
- Click Launch Approval Process to update the Status of the contract to Pending Approval, as well as update the Status of the approvals with the lowest step number to Pending Approval. There can be more than one approval at the lowest step number for parallel approvals.
The system automatically notifies the first approver in the sequence. To advance the contract workflow, an approver will use one of three action buttons to change the Status of the approval record:
- Approve: sends the contract to the next approver in the sequence.
- Require Changes: sends the contract back to the contract manager to make changes.
- Permanently Reject: used only if the contract requires significant changes.
Both Require Changes and Permanently Reject require the user to enter notes in the Approval Notes field. These notes are appended to the Approval Notes field in the Contract record, and are also viewable from any other Approval record linked to that contract.
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Notes that are relevant to the general contract process are entered into the General Notes field on the Details tab, and notes pertaining to the approval process are entered into the Approval Notes field on the Approvals tab.
Emails can be sent to Internal Contacts and External Party Contacts from the Emails tab.
- Choose the type of Recipient(s), which can be Internal Contacts, External Party Contacts, or External Party and Internal Contacts.
- Select the Email Title, which can be used as a template. For more information see Email Texts.
- Click the lookup icon to select the contacts to email. Fill out the Email Subject and Email Text fields as needed.
- Select necessary files to send with the email, then click Send Email.
Turning Off Approvals
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This tab is also used to create an amendment or SOW of an existing contract. Select the type of record you wish to create, then click the Create Related Contract button. The new record gets linked to the current contract in a child relationship.
The Diagram icon is used to generate a diagram of Contract records that are related to this Contract record.
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The Signature tab contains fields for contract document signers, and contains all fields related to DocuSign and Adobe Sign. If you are not using either system, these fields can simply be removed from the layout. The Files to Sign field holds attached files from the Attachments table that have a To Be eSigned value of Yes. The Refresh Files action button refreshes this field in case changes to the attachments were made in the same session under the Attachments tab.
Fields under the Signers heading are used to populate the signature page of the contract's print templates and to identify the signers for either program. For this reason, these fields must be filled before generating an attachment from a template, which in turn must be generated and set as To Be eSigned before returning to the Signature tab in order to create envelopes.
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Once the contract is ready to sign, use the Create DocuSign Envelope action button to create a DocuSign Envelope record and attach the files held in the Files to Sign field.
This also create a DocuSign Recipient record for each signer. These records are then shown in the related tables for DocuSign Envelopes and DocuSign Recipients on the Signature tab. Only users in the Admin and DocuSign Users groups can access the DocuSign fields on the Signature tab. For more information on DocuSign, refer to the DocuSign User Manual.
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Once the contract is ready to sign, click the Create Adobe Sign Envelope button. This creates an Adobe Sign Envelope, and convert the signers into recipients.
Contract Processing
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If the contract has a Status of Approved, the Mark as Pending Signature button is visible in the common area. This button sets the contract Status to Pending Signature.
Once the Status of the contract is Pending Signature, a Mark as Signed button appears. This button sets the contract Status to Signed.
Tasks and Obligations Tab
The Tasks tab becomes visible when the Contract Type selected is marked as Uses Tasks on the Contract Type table.
This tab is used to manage various tasks and obligations related to to the Contract. The three sections, described in more detail below, help provide an overview of and track all activities that must be performed in the course of executing and managing a contract.
All Contract Tasks
This section becomes visible when the Contract Type selected is marked as Uses Tasks on the Contract Type table.
The Task Generation The Task Generation Method is established in the Contract Type record. In the Standard System Demo, all contract types are set to show the Tasks tab and to allow the creation of ad hoc tasks. Depending on the Task Generation Method set on the Contract Type, the user will be able to choose from a task workflow, select from possible tasks, or create ad hoc tasks as needed. Refer to the Contract Types section for more information on setting the Task Generation Method.
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- Select the workflow from the choices available in the Task Workflow field drop-down list
- Click the Generate Tasks button.
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User Selected Tasks
To create tasks using a generation method of User Selected Tasks:
- Select the relevant tasks from the multichoice list
- Click the Generate Tasks button.
User Generated Ad Hoc Tasks
When this is the task generation method, the user creates tasks using the Add Ad Hoc Tasks button as needed. Refer to the Tasks Table section for details on creating tasks.
Working with Tasks
All Tasks are created regardless of their Task Usage (Default/Conditional), and are set to Assigned based on their Assignment Trigger (Date/Status/Creation). Tasks that are Queued do not yet require action, as their Assignment Trigger has not been met. Tasks that are conditional remain conditional until their Assignment Trigger is met, at which point the condition will be evaluated, and they either become Assigned if the condition is met or Not Needed if the condition is not met.
As individual tasks are completed, the Contract Owner is notified if the individual task is configured to notify the Contract Owner. Once all individual tasks on the Contract are completed, the Contract Owner is notified regardless of how individual task notifications are configured.
Finance Tab
All Contract Obligations
This section allows the user to add ad hoc obligations and/or generate default ones. Clicking the 'Generate Default Obligations' button finds and creates all default obligations for the Contract's selected Contract Type, as well as for all the Clause Types used in the Contract (as seen in the Attachment tab). The 'Add Obligation' button allows the user to add a new Obligation in the same way they add an ad hoc Task.
Obligations are tasks of Type 'Obligation'. They provide all the assignment and recurrence options found while creating a standard Task, but also some additional Obligation-related options.
- Obligation Clause Text: Obligations created from Clause Type defaults display the Clause Text for reference.
- Obligation Type: The primary party responsible for the obligation - Customer, Internal, Customer and Internal, Partner, or External.
- Obligation Output: The output of the Obligation, such as Payment, Report, Document, etc.
Manage Task/Obligation Recurrence (via Parents)
This section displays the parents of all recurring Tasks and allows you to manage their recurrence settings or even cancel further recurrences.
Working with Tasks and Obligations
All Tasks and Obligations are created regardless of their Task Usage (Default/Conditional), and are set to Assigned based on their Assignment Trigger (Date/Status/Creation). Tasks and Obligations that are Queued do not yet require action, as their Assignment Trigger has not been met. Tasks and Obligations that are conditional remain conditional until their Assignment Trigger is met, at which point the condition will be evaluated, and they either become Assigned if the condition is met or Not Needed if the condition is not met.
As individual Tasks and Obligations are completed, the Contract Owner is notified if the individual task is configured to notify the Contract Owner. Once all individual Tasks and Obligations on the Contract are completed, the Contract Owner is notified regardless of how individual task notifications are configured.
Finance Tab
This tab contains Budget details as well as information regarding Payments.
Add Budget Details
This section allows the user to add new Budget Items for the Contract. The following fields are available:
- Cost Center: Choose from a list of Cost Centers.
- Filter by Department / Show All: Field that determines if the list of Cost Centers to pick from is limited to the Contract's Department's Cost Centers.
- Fiscal Year: The Fiscal Year for which the Budget Item is being added.
- Budget Amount: A currency field for the budget amount.
- Add Budget Item: Button to convert the above details into a Contract Budget Item record.
Budget Details For This Contract
Shows the Budget Items added directly to this Contract from the above section in a related table. The related table allows you to quick-edit all of the fields from above in order to allow for easy corrections.
The section additionally displays:
- Total Budget for This Contract: The sum of all Active Budget Items linked to this Contract.
- % of Contract Amount Budgeted: The Total Budget for This Contract as a percentage of the Contract Amount.
- Budget Remaining for This Contract: The difference between the Total Budget for This Contract and the Total Payments for This Contract.
- % of Budget Spent for This Contract: The remaining budget for the contract as a percentage of the Total Budget for This Contract.
All Related Budget Items
This section is only displayed for Master Agreements or Contracts that have no parents. It displays all budget items for the current Master Agreement / Contract as well as all their children, providing the user a complete view of the budget for the entire hierarchy.
It additionally displays a calculated result for the Total Budget for All Contracts (in the hierarchy).
Related Payments
This section displays all Payment records linked to the current Contract record. Its visibility Information regarding payments and budget is stored in the Finance tab. Visibility of this tab is based on the current Contract Type. The fields in this tab section include:
- Related Payments: Related table that shows all the payment records associated with the contract.
- Total Budget: Same as Contract Amount.
- Total Payments for This Contract: Sum of Completed payments within the Related payments table.
- Budget Remaining: Amount obtained by subtracting Total Completed Payments from Total Budget.
- Budget Used: Percentage of Total Budget used.
The visibility of the Budgeting sections is dependent upon the Cost Type being Payable.
Risk Analysis
A Contract Manager can perform Risk Analysis on Contract records. Risk Conditions are pre-defined on the Risk Conditions table based on criteria within the contract or modifications made to standard clauses. To run a Risk Analysis:
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In the Contract Party Information section, users can find and link to an existing company and contact, or create new ones as needed. Before adding new information, ensure that you check for all possible alternate spellings or stylizations of the desired value. To create a new company, elect New Company and then enter the name and address information. After the contract is submitted for review, Contract Managers need to confirm the new company before the new Contract record can be finished. Similarly, contract creators can suggest a new company contact by filling out the fields in the Party Main Contact section of the form.
Once the required information is filled in, the Contract record can be saved for later revisions. The contract requester can also press the Submit for Review button to request approval from a contract manager. Contract requesters can be contacted to update the submitted contract, but they are typically no longer involved in the approval process from this point forward. After the contract requester submits the contract for review, a contract manager decides whether to continue with the approval process or reject the contract request.
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