Contract Management
Contracts, From Request to Signed Copy Without the Printing, Scanning and Posting
For legal, commercial and procurement teams managing contracts across the business.
The Reality.
Most contracts start as a Word document saved over an older one. The draft goes out by email for comment, comes back with tracked changes from several people, gets printed for signature, scanned, and saved to a shared drive or someone’s desktop. When a question comes up months later about what was agreed, the first job is finding out which version was signed and where it was filed. Renewal dates sit in someone’s calendar, and when that person moves on, a contract can roll over on terms nobody reviewed.
Your legal and commercial teams spend their time chasing signatures and searching for the signed copy.
The Cost of Doing Nothing
Time
Hours spent circulating drafts, printing, scanning and posting documents for signature, then searching shared drives for the signed copy
Money
Contracts that roll over on old pricing because a notice date was missed, and commitments finance can't see until the invoice arrives
Risk
The wrong version signed, contracts kept past their retention period, and no clear record of who approved what
Speed
Sales and supplier agreements waiting days for a signature from someone who is travelling or out of the office
People
Legal and commercial staff doing filing and follow-up instead of the review and negotiation they were hired for
Every contract that stays on paper and email is one more your team will have to search for later.
There's a Better Way
Contracts can move from request to signature on one platform.
A contract is drafted, approved internally, signed electronically filed in one place, and everyone involved can see what stage it has reached.
Introducing docuForce for Contract Management
docuForce is Metrofile’s document management and workflow automation platform. Its Contract Management capability takes a contract from request through drafting, internal approval and electronic signature to storage, and applies your retention policy once it is signed. It’s built for businesses handling contracts across several departments, counterparties or approval levels, who want that process off email, printers and shared drives and onto one platform.
Result
Contracts signed without printing, scanning or posting, and one place to find the version that was signed.
Who this is for
Legal and compliance teams
Every signed contract held in one access-controlled, audit-ready repository, with retention periods applied and a full audit trail on each document
Sales and commercial teams
Quotes and agreements signed electronically on any device, so a deal isn't held up waiting for a printer, a courier or a wet signature
Procurement teams
Vendor agreements kept in one place, with renewal and notice dates flagged before they pass
Finance teams
A view across the contract portfolio of committed spend, contract value and what is due to expire
Executives and approvers
Contracts routed to you for sign-off, which you can approve directly from email or on mobile without logging into another system
Key Features
| Feature | What it means for you |
| eSignature | Contracts are signed legally on a phone, tablet or laptop, with a full audit trail on every signed document |
| Approval Workflows | A contract goes out only once the right people have approved it, and they can approve straight from email, with escalation when a deadline is close |
| Version Control | You can always identify the version that was signed, and roll back to an earlier draft when you need to |
| Central Repository | Every signed contract sits in one access-controlled place and can be retrieved in seconds |
| Retention Policies | Contracts are kept for as long as they need to be and disposed of in line with your policy, without anyone tracking dates by hand |
- Drafts emailed back and forth with no clear latest version
- Contracts printed, signed, scanned and posted
- Internal approvals chased over email with no record of who agreed to what
- Signed copies saved to shared drives, desktops and filing cabinets
- Renewal and notice dates kept in someone's calendar, if anywhere
- Retention managed by hand, or not at all
- Full version history, with the signed version always identifiable
-
Contracts signed electronically on any device
- Approvals routed automatically and actioned from email, with a full audit trail
- Every signed contract stored in one access-controlled repository
- Contract owners alerted ahead of renewal and notice dates
- Retention policies applied automatically
How It Works
docuForce handles three contract flows, depending on where a contract starts.
Your own contracts – Requested, drafted, reviewed and approved internally, then sent to the other party, signed electronically and stored in the repository.
Contracts from the other party – Captured from email, scan or upload, indexed, and routed for legal and commercial review. Once negotiated, the contract is signed electronically and stored alongside your own.
Renewals – As a renewal or notice date approaches, the contract owner is alerted to renew, renegotiate or serve notice, and the outcome is recorded against the contract.
Across all three, access is controlled by role and every document carries a full audit trail from first draft to signature.
Beyond Contract Management
The same platform runs other recurring approval processes, such as supplier invoices, CAPEX requests and expense claims in finance, employee onboarding and leave requests in HR, support and access requests in IT, and customer onboarding. Because docuForce is low code, the next process can be added to the platform you already use.
That’s Smarter. Leaner. Faster
Why Metrofile
Doing it yourself | Doing it with Metrofile |
| Print, sign, scan and post | Legally compliant eSignature on any device |
| Chase internal sign-off over email | Approval workflows with escalation, actioned from email |
| Work out which version was signed | Full version history with rollback |
| Search shared drives for the signed copy | One central repository, retrieved in seconds |
| Track retention dates by hand | Retention policies applied automatically |
| Build your own audit trail | Full audit trail, unlimited storage, unlimited users |
