Terms and Conditions Added to Estimate

[Electrician]

I am thinking about using Square Invoice for my residential electrical service company, but there are a few things I need to be sure of before switching.

Currently I have a half page long "Terms and Conditions" disclaimer on the back of my estimates, this is very important as it spells out all the legal stuff.

Is there a way to automatically add this to Estimates in Square?

I have seen a way to make a contract and send it to up to 25 people, but that won't help.  I don't want to be sending contacts to people separately, they need to be part of the estimate. 

I have also seen a way to attach a contract to an invoice, but I need my terms and conditions attached to the estimate, not the invoice, 

And I see that I could attach my own PDF terms and conditions to the estimate, which is completely unacceptable.  This would highly complicate this, especially when on the road doing it mobile.  Plus it would be easy to forget to do, which would leave me in legal hot water.

It seems like a simple thing, estimates NEED terms and conditions.  

[Minion · Accepted solution]

Hey again @Electrician 

As of right now, there isn't a way to do what you are asking.  I think it would obviously be beneficial, and definitely save a a few steps, IF we were able to create a default Estimate template and have a contract/TAC/TOS section automatically by default like we are able to, to an extent with the default Invoice . BUt that also leads to the further problem of how many characters should this then be limited to?  My Terms and Conditions could be maybe 100 characters, as yours could 1000 so what would be a good default?

With that being said, I don't think that having to upload and attach your own PDF is that much more work for the time being.  Whether doing an estimate from mobile or desktop, the PDF can be saved and access from multiple places across all of your devices depending on the platform and really only requires 2 more pushes or clicks of a button for the time being.  Your estimate and TAC's are then organized properly

My opinion, but I also agree that an additional field could be helpful if its something that would be used by the majority of users as well.  I would definitely urge you to request this feature and hopefully it draws some interest and implemented in the near future. 

[Electrician]

Thanks again for the reply.

As for how many characters the limit would be, I am not sure. All of the other estimating and invoicing apps I have used I have never been limited. The terms and conditions are on the back page.

To attach my own PDF of terms and conditions, how would I do this from an iPhone, which doesn’t have the typical internal file system that is accessible like on a computer.

I could go waste my time requesting this feature, but people have already been doing that for years and square hasn’t cared.

For the most part I really like square estimating an invoicing, it’s just a shame that such small and easily fixable issues are most likely going to prevent me from using it. And therefore it will stop Square from processing a very large amount of money.  

[Minion]

---

@Electrician wrote:

Thanks again for the reply.

As for how many characters the limit would be, I am not sure. All of the other estimating and invoicing apps I have used I have never been limited. The terms and conditions are on the back page.

To attach my own PDF of terms and conditions, how would I do this from an iPhone, which doesn’t have the typical internal file system that is accessible like on a computer.

I could go waste my time requesting this feature, but people have already been doing that for years and square hasn’t cared.

For the most part I really like square estimating an invoicing, it’s just a shame that such small and easily fixable issues are most likely going to prevent me from using it. And therefore it will stop Square from processing a very large amount of money.  

---

No problem at all. Just trying to help out and offer suggestions or alternatives.   I don't' generally use estimates a whole lot like I do Invoices, but I have a decent understanding since it tie in with the invoices. 

Yeah it does seem like more of a simple lay out fix that could accommodate that feature, however if there is no feature request it will most certainly go unnoticed. 

You actually have me stumped there when it comes to Iphone, as I run Android and (All Pixel Devices) so everything syncs up pretty straightforward for me there. 

I'm sure someone that uses Apple products will  chime in and may be able to offer solutions to you on how they integrate with attachments. 

[Electrician]

I think I know of a way to do it using the iPhone, but much like in the other thread, I’m getting kind of grumpy that I would have to jump through those hoops every time I want to send an estimate.

I see Square talking about wanting to make it easier and better for the sellers, yet they don’t do the simple little things that the sellers ask for.

I actually find it a bit disturbing that a credit card processing company (lots of lawyers, strict policies, etc.) wouldn’t have provisions to add terms and conditions to estimates. Every other estimating and invoicing app out there has it.

I will do as you said and request the feature. And please don’t take my bitterness as directed at you, I know you are just another seller like me and I certainly appreciate you taking the time to help.

[Minion]

---

@Electrician wrote:

I think I know of a way to do it using the iPhone, but much like in the other thread, I’m getting kind of grumpy that I would have to jump through those hoops every time I want to send an estimate.

I see Square talking about wanting to make it easier and better for the sellers, yet they don’t do the simple little things that the sellers ask for.

I actually find it a bit disturbing that a credit card processing company (lots of lawyers, strict policies, etc.) wouldn’t have provisions to add terms and conditions to estimates. Every other estimating and invoicing app out there has it.

I will do as you said and request the feature. And please don’t take my bitterness as directed at you, I know you are just another seller like me and I certainly appreciate you taking the time to help.

---

No worries at all.  I didn't take it as directed toward me.  Its all good just a bunch of sellers trying to help one another where we can.

Hope to see you around here more though.

Cheers

[Electrician]

So I looked into it further.  When using my iPhone and making an estimate, on the first step it offers me to option to add an attachment as well as to attach a Square contract.

It says that contracts can only be created and edited on Squareup.com and shows no results since I haven't made one.

So I go to make one, but it needs a recipient.  I was able to create a template, but when I try to make a contract it needs one or more recipients entered or else it won't go forward.

So how do I save a generic contract so I can attach it in the mobile app?

EDIT:  Now I am seeing that this won't work. It seems as if this would only work if I had previously had a contract with this same customer, and just want to attach that specific contract to this estimate.

[B-Tek]

This is the same problem I am coming up with. You have to link a generic contract from squareup.com to a customer and NOT send it to them, but save it as a PDF to your files, which will allow you to access it in invoices. Then you have to go back into invoices app to grab the estimate or make one, and attach the square contract you made. Once you send the estimate, they get a estimate with a link going to the contract. HOWEVER, if you don’t mention they must sign the contract/service agreement, they might not know and just accept the estimate without signing the contract/agreement.

It is WAY to many steps and cumbersome to go through all these hoops just to add a generic contract for them to read and sign. Other option is just sending them the contract separately to sign then sending another for the estimate.

It would be really nice if they incorporate this a little better, along with allowing contracts to be made/edited right in the invoices app rather than having to go to a browser each time.

[Electrician]

When using the Invoicing app, I would like to be able to make a new Estimate which has Terms and Conditions added to it automatically.  This is a feature that every other estimating app has and I can't see why Square wouldn't also incorporate it.

I am thinking about using Square for estimates and invoices for my electrical service business.  Having Terms and Conditions on the estimate is an absolute necessity.    

[Electrician]

Did somebody move this last reply of mine? I thought I posted it in the feature request section?