Overview
On the Proposal Details page, there are many actions that you can take. These are listed at the top of the page:
Or below the proposal:
This article will discuss some of the more common actions. It picks up after you have sent the Contact the proposal, but as a reminder:
- If the contact has an email address, you will have a Send button that will deliver the proposal via email. The contact will be able to click a link in the email to view the proposal.
- You can also Save the proposal (which won't email it) and continue to work on it later until you're ready to send it.
Video Tutorial
Click Here to Watch a Demonstration
Proposal Acceptance
After you have created a Proposal, you can send the lead/prospect/opportunity a link to that proposal. If you have notifications turned on, an email will automatically be generated and sent to the Contact.
This is a live proposal link, so if you make edits and save the Proposal - you do not have generate a new link to send to them. The proposal will also update on their end.
External Accept
The potential customer can click on Accept and apply an electronic signature to the proposal. If the proposal has any options, they can also choose the options they want. Once they accept it, you'll receive an email notification so you can then contact them to schedule.
Internal Accept
You or someone within your company can accept on behalf of the Contact. If you want to mark the proposal as accepted verbally, there is an Accept option on the Proposal Details page. You'll be prompted for the name that you're accepting on behalf of.
Then you can schedule after clicking Accept.
Proposal Scheduling
Once a Proposal has been accepted (or even if it's Open and you're ready to move forward), you can schedule the work to be done. Depending on the Service as well as whether it will be a single appointment or multiple, you have several options available.
For the simple case where the proposal will turn into a single appointment, you can just click the Schedule button (or link, if from a grid). You'll be taken to the Schedule an Appointment page and everything will be pre-populated, including the contact. Select the date and time or any other scheduling options and schedule the appointment like you would any other regular appointment.
If the proposal's Service has Chaining enabled, you can still schedule the Proposal. The proposal will then list all of the appointments as part of the Project. The completion percentage will also automatically calculate.
You can also schedule appointments directly using the Add an Appointment action. Any proposal that has more than one appointment scheduled/attached to it will be converted to a Project and show up in the Projects snapshot. They will continue to be in that snapshot until all attached appointments are completed. Learn more about Project-Based Business Flow.
Clear An Acceptance
If you realize that you need to make an edit to an accepted Proposal, it is easy to do so. This proposal cannot have been invoiced, or you will be unable to edit.
If you are on the Contact Details page, you will see an Accepted Proposal show up this way.
Click on the Date of the proposal you want to edit.
Scroll to the bottom of the Proposal page. There is a section called Acceptance. If the proposal hasn't been accepted, you will see a blank field. If it has been accepted, it will tell you by whom and what the date of acceptance was.
Hit Clear. A popup will ask if you are sure you want to unaccept the proposal. Click Yes, and the proposal will go back to Open status. You can then decline it (by hitting Decline at the top) or let it expire.
This will make the proposal Open again. This will allow you to make edits, then accept the proposal internally on the customer's behalf or send it to the customer to have them add a signature.
If the proposal has already been invoiced/scheduled, the status may not revert back to Open.
Did you (or the Contact) accidentally Decline instead of accept? You can fix it the same way. Scroll down to the Acceptance section and you will see the date of the decline and the same Clear button.
You can see all the options of Decline Reasons if you go to Control Panel > Proposals.
View Proposals (Customer View)
To View a previously created proposal, you can go to Open Proposals located under Snapshots in the left-hand Navigation Panel.
(or) You can go to the Contact Details page > Proposal tab.
Then click on the Date of the Proposal that you would like to view.
That will open the Proposal Details page. Then click the View button at the top of the screen to see what the proposal looks like from the customer perspective.
This customer view will also show terms and conditions and the customer signature.
Print a Proposal
Clicking Print will deliver the signature block and all attachments, while "right clicking" to print the page will remove the signature block.
Attached photos print "2-up" to save space. This is the same for proposals and/or invoices.
FAQs
If I clear the acceptance and then accept it again, it would change who accepted the proposal and the IP address. Does that make the terms and conditions not legally binding?
We are not legal counsel and it may be different depending on terms and conditions of the brand or your own attorney's recommendations. Within serviceminder, if the customer originally accepted the proposal that is considered an external acceptance and an IP address is captured. If you have to clear the acceptance for whatever reason and re-accept the proposal on behalf of someone then it is considered an internal acceptance and capture your IP address in the audit trail.
Which circumstances would SM automatically invoice a proposal after it's accepted?
The system will automatically invoice the proposal if the Invoicing Mode on the service is set to "Proposal Accept" and a payment is made from the client's end at signing. This isn't just for payment plans, it includes if you just marked a deposit amount required when creating the proposal
To change the Invoice Mode setting you would go to Control Panel, then click on Services. Then you click Edit on the service you want to make the change to. You will find it under the Invoicing section of that page.
Can I edit the Proposal Print Template?
Yes, however, it is HTML based. That means you need to have a modicum of coding know-how. We DO NOT recommend attempting that unless you are confident in your abilities. You can also submit a Support ticket about what changes you would like to see.
We cannot accommodate every and all changes to the Proposal Print Template. You can always ask, but we may say 'no'.
Troubleshooting
We have an issue where we cannot edit an already accepted proposal and have to make the changes on the invoice. When this happens, technicians cannot see the updated invoice when they go to Projects and can only see the old accepted proposal.
You can use a Change Order if you need to edit an accepted proposal that already has been invoiced or scheduled. With a change order, you can add new items, or remove line items by entering a negative quantity. Once the change order has been accepted (either internally or by the client) you'll need to merge the invoices so that your techs see the final information.
