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1. Contracts in general

Contract management in general is the systematic process of handling contract creation, analysis, and maintenance to maximize operational and financial performance while minimizing risk. It is essential for businesses to effectively manage agreements with customers, suppliers and partners.

Effective contract management involves several critical activities:

• Monitoring: Tracking relevant contract details

• Renewals: Managing changes and ensuring timely renewals to maintain continuous operations.

• Record Keeping: Organizing and maintaining contract documents for easy access and reference.

• Risk Management: Identifying and mitigating potential risks associated with contract terms.

Overall, contract management enhances contract oversight, improves financial transparency, and supports informed decision-making, ultimately contributing to the efficient management of the organization’s contractual obligations and assets.

2. What is this module about

For more information on the content of this module, including detailed descriptions of some of the core components, see: Contract module in the 'Application Managers' section.

3. Why use this module

This module centralizes all relevant contract data in one place, providing clear and immediate access to contract details. Users benefit from automated reminders and reports, ensuring awareness of upcoming contract terminations and deadlines. This proactive approach helps prevent human error and facilitates timely renewals or negotiations.

Additionally, the module offers clear insights into the financial implications of contracts, allowing for better budget management and financial planning. By integrating with other modules, users gain comprehensive visibility into active contracts related to buildings and assets. For example, if a work order is created for a malfunctioning piece of equipment, the system can identify and link any active maintenance contracts associated with that asset. This integration ensures that service desk users are aware of existing service agreements, facilitating more efficient and cost-effective resolution of issues.

3.1 Choices to be made within the module

Apart from the basics that are always available in this module (contract registration including financial details per period and contract reminders) the most relevant additional choices that can be made when using this module are the following:

1. If the contract module is also going to be used to track and report on the financial components of a contract (creating contract items with a price per period), should these contract items also be linked to the relevant master data objects (buildings, areas, assets)? By doing so, more cross module insights can be used (e.g. insights in active contracts for when a request is created regarding a malfunctioning asset, if that asset is linked to a (maintenance) contract with a supplier). If this is desired, make sure the relevant master data modules are also implemented.

2. Is the contract indexation function relevant to be used? This is most likely only relevant in case of contracts for which the customer is receiving money, instead of paying it (as in the second case, the new prices will likely be determined by the supplier). Via the indexation function, the prices of a selection of contract(item)s can easily be indexed with a certain amount or percentage. Next to using the indexation option to index contracts automatically, it is also possible to use the option to automatically generate index letters (emails that can be send to the contract parties involved, informing them on the new prices). This feature needs to be enabled via the Contract module settings. For more information about this functionality, see Contract management (users)

3. Are the contracts also going to be invoiced via Workplace Management? This is most likely only relevant in case of contracts for which the customer is receiving money, instead of paying it. In this case, the outgoing invoice module, including contract invoices runs should also be implemented. For more information about this functionality, see Contract management (users), Outgoing invoices (users) and Invoice runs (users)

4. How to activate this module

As for every new module, use the ‘Module activation’ option on the administrator startboard (only available for level 2 and 3 admins). For more general information about these 'Module activation' options, see Module activation.

4.1 Prerequisites before enabling this module

The contract module does not require any other modules to be activated before. However, if you want to be able to link a specific building, area and/or asset to a contract item, these modules will need to be activated first. Otherwise, it is only possible to create generic contract items, not liked to any object.

For more information about these modules see:

• Masterdata: Buildings and areas module activation and information

• Masterdata: Assets module activation and information

4.2 Module activation

For this specific module activation, multiple settings and options apply:

Settings to be determined:

Send notifications: Enable this option to set the default value for the option to send a contract reminder for each new contract that is created. This option can be altered per new contract that will be created and the setting here only applies to the default value..

Default number of days before term of notice period notifications send: With this you can determine how many days before the end date of the term of notice period of a contract a reminder must be sent. This will be set as the default value for each (new) contract. When registering a contract, this value can always be adjusted per contract. When 30 days is filled in here, a notification will be send 30 days before the term of notice date.

To whom a contract reminder must be sent must be entered when registering a contract

4.2.1 Workflow emails

The emails that are automatically sent via the workflow (for this module, only the reminder email when a contract period is ending) are also generated and shown in the include on the module activation after the module activation is started. If the customer does not want to use one or more workflow emails, the emails can directly be deleted from the overview. For more information on workflow emails: Standard Workflow emails

For a detailed description of the emails sent via the workflow, see: Contract module in the 'Application Managers' section.

4.3 Data imports

When activating this module, some data imports become available, which can be used to quickly import relevant data into the system (as opposed to manually entering this data, which is also possible).

Relevant data imports become available in the module activation after the activation has been started. Default data imports can also be found on the admin startboard (only for level 2 and level 3 administrators).

For more information on data imports in general, see: Data imports

If the Contract module is activated, the following default import connectors become available:

4.4 System groups

When a module is activated, system groups become available that can be assigned to user profiles. These system groups will give users access to (a subset of) navigation menu options, startboard tabs, and tasks in the relevant workflow(s).

For more general information on user profiles, system groups, users, and the user profile dashboard, see: User management

For the Contract module, the following system groups become available:

Via the 'User profile management' option on the administrator startboard, these system groups can be assigned to existing user profiles or add them to newly created user profiles.

4.4.1 Relevant system groups from other modules:

For some modules, other (master data) modules might be of importance, in order to be able to fully use this module.

[…..] Financial module and groups in case invoicing is relevant

4.5 Navigation menu and startboard options

When a module is activated, the relevant navigation menu options become available to users with the correct authorizations (based on the system groups). Next, a module-specific key user startboard tab becomes available for that particular module and is visible depending on the user's authorizations. This tab gives users insights and day-to-day work overviews relevant to the specific module.

For more general information on the navigation menu and startboard, see: https://spacewell.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/KB/pages/441712705/Authorizing+users#2.2-Navigation-menu-and-Startboard

For the Contract module, the following navigation menu options become available:

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5. Additional reports

Additional reports can be available for some modules via the ‘Reports’ navigation menu option.

[…..]

6. Additional settings and options after enabling

For some modules, additional settings can be configured after the initial module activation via the 'Module settings' option on the administrator startboard. A module is always activated with the most used settings pre-defined. After the module is activated, the module may have more advanced settings available, which can be managed via the Module settings as well.

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7. Additional information

No additional information currently.

8. User manual

For the user manual with a more step-by-step explanation of the process itself, see: Contract management for (end)users.

9. Q&A

Waiting for questions to be answered.