Contracts

A contract is the legal agreement between your company and a customer — what they buy, for how long, at what price, on what payment terms. In HotCRM, contracts are the system of record for active customer relationships: once activated, they unlock the Customer status on the account.

The 5 statuses

Activation is the key transition — it triggers the account to be promoted to Customer.

The 6 contract types

What a contract record stores

Billing frequency

How often the customer is invoiced:

• One-Time
• Monthly
• Quarterly
• Annual
• Custom

Payment terms

When the customer pays:

• Net 15 — within 15 days of invoice
• Net 30 (default) — within 30 days
• Net 45 / Net 60 / Net 90
• Due on Receipt — immediately
• Prepaid — paid upfront

Renewals

Three fields drive renewals:

• Auto-Renew — does the contract roll over automatically?
• Renewal Notice Days — how many days before end-date to alert the team (e.g., 60 days)
• Renewal Terms — free-text instructions ("renew at 5% uplift unless customer opts out")

When the contract enters its renewal window, the system creates a follow-up task and emails the contract owner.

What the system does automatically

On contract activation

The owner promotes the contract to Activated:

1. Account status → Customer if it was a Prospect.
2. Customer Since date stamped on the account if blank.
3. Welcome email sent to the primary contact (configurable).
4. Notification to the account owner.

Daily — expiration sweep

Each night at midnight the system finds Activated contracts whose end date has passed:

1. Status → Expired.
2. Notification to the contract owner.
3. Notification to the account owner.

Daily — renewal reminder

At 8 AM the system finds contracts entering their renewal window (within renewal_notice_days of end date) and sends a reminder to the contract owner with a one-click action to "Create Renewal Opportunity".

Manual termination

The owner can change status to Terminated. This is a one-way action — terminated contracts can't be reactivated. Audit log records who and when.

Built-in rules

• End date must be after start date — basic sanity check.
• Contract value must be zero or positive — NDAs can be $0.
• Activated contracts cannot be deleted — change status to Terminated instead.

Sharing

Contracts follow the account's sharing — if you can see the account, you can see its contracts. The contract owner, the account owner, and the account team have edit access. Read access flows up the role hierarchy.

Standard list views

• My Active Contracts — owner = me AND status = Activated.
• Expiring in 60 Days — end_date <= TODAY + 60 AND status = Activated.
• Up for Renewal — within renewal-notice window.
• Expired This Month — status = Expired AND last_modified IN this month.
• Pending Activation — status IN [Draft, In Approval].

Tips for contract owners

• ✅ Attach the signed PDF when activating — auditors will thank you.
• ✅ Set Renewal Notice Days = 90 for enterprise deals — gives you a full quarter to negotiate.
• ✅ Use Renewal Terms field to capture the deal — "price-locked for 3 years; 5% uplift on renewal".

Tips for sales reps

• ✅ When a quote is accepted and you create the contract, the opportunity link is pre-filled — keep it; it powers post-sale reporting.
• ✅ Don't sneak edits into Activated contracts — create an amendment instead (a new contract linked to the same account).

Tips for admins

• The contract activation flow and expiration sweep can be customized. See Administration › Automation.
• Contract types and billing frequency picklists are extensible.