Fixed Term Agreement

Fixed Term Agreement

Introduction

Fixed Term Agreements (FTA) allow a licensee or practice to charge a client fees for a period of 12 months or less and who do not wish to sign up for an ongoing fee arrangement. There are instances where this can be greater than 12 months. For these cases an alert icon will be seen.



Where to find FTA functionality

All steps to manage FTA obligations for a client can be found in the Advanced Admin > Fixed Term Agreement Management > Manage Agreements module of AdviceOS.


AdviceOS supports FTA processes by allowing their Users to track start and end dates, payment methods and fees, and relevant reminder dates to be tracked against a client. This information can then be generated into an FTA template quickly and easily.

This guide outlines the functionality to create, publish and track fixed term agreements with your clients.

Process to create FTAs

While FTAs are not as complex as the process involved in generating FDSs, it is still important to follow a set order of steps to ensure efficient and accurate generation of FTAs. Midwinter recommends you complete the following steps within AdviceOS:

1.     Create fixed term agreement

2.     Record relevant date information

3.     Select the correct services & fees applicable

4.     Publish, generate FTA and record responses

 

When the above is complete, you can expire older agreements where the end date has passed and create a new agreement following the above process. All previous FTAs will be available to review within this module.

The FTA process also allows flexibility in maintaining multiple agreements if a User wishes, however these can only be held at the individual level or group level. 


Setting up a Fixed Term Agreement

As mentioned above, all steps to managing FTA obligations for a client can be found in Advanced Admin > Fixed Term Agreement Management > Manage Agreements module of AdviceOS.

Creating the Agreement

An agreement can be setup for either an individual or the client group. To setup an agreement, select who the agreement is for in the drop down and click the ‘Created Fixed Term Agreement’ on the right.


You will be prompted with a dialog box which asks the user to enter the basic details of the agreement.

Note that each of these details can still be changed once you save the FTA.





You will be prompted prior to creating an FTA if there is either an active ongoing service agreement for this member or a fixed term agreement at either the joint or individual level.

While AdviceOS allows a client to have both an active FTA and active ongoing service agreement, FTA agreements must be setup at the individual or client group level. If there is an active individual agreement, there cannot be an active joint agreement and you will be prompted to cancel the other agreement before you can proceed further with this process.




Setting the agreement details

Once you have saved the initial dialogue, you can make final adjustments to your fixed term agreement as well as completing the remaining steps in this process including:
  1. Setting up a reminder date prior to the FTA end date
  2. Adding any relevant platform fees or additional fees where applicable
  3. Updating the services received within this FTA either using the existing services from the selected service package or by manually adding certain services 


Setting a reminder date allows your practice or licensee to flag how many days prior to the end date you wish to be notified. This can be set at 30 / 60 / 90 days prior, or a custom date of your choosing. You will be unable to select a custom date after the end date.

This also allows you to set up notifications within AdviceOS based on this date so that this reminder is not missed within your office day to day activities. This can be achieved by setting up event mapping and client notifications. If you are unfamiliar to this process please review our help centre for guides on setting up a task within AdviceOS or reach out to the support team for assistance.


Publishing your agreement

When the agreement is initially created, it will sit in the draft status. Once you have completed all steps above, the final step will be to publish your agreement.




While the 'date commenced' and ‘end date’ are the only two mandatory fields required to publish the FTA, once it has been published you will be unable to change majority of fields for this agreement. Please ensure all steps are completed prior to publishing.



Preparing and issuing your agreement

Once you have published your FTA, you will be prompted with additional fields to be completed which will allow you to track when the FTA was provided to your client and the response and date of response.

Generating your FTA

The next step will be to generate your FTA by clicking on the button found on the right of the page. You can select the default Midwinter template or create your own FTA template if you wish. This will need to be uploaded at either the Practice or Licensee level and Plan Type ‘Client – Fixed term agreement’ used.


It is recommended to also update the Sent Date so that the office can confirm and track that the document has been both generated and sent to the client, however this is an optional field for client management.

Client response

Once the client has returned the signed FTA and confirmed their response, this can be updated in the appropriate fields.

The ‘FTA Response’ field is an information only field and does not change the status of the FTA. If a client returns the FTA with a decline, you will need to also change the status (which can be found in the next section of this user guide).


Additional Information

Altering the status

Once the FTA has been published, you are then presented with a number of options available to make further changes to the status of the agreement

Expired – Expired indicates that the FTA end date has passed and you wish to end this agreement

Terminate – Terminate indicates that the client has elected to end/cancel this existing agreement prior to the specified date

Delete – While the above two status options will ensure these FTAs remain in the system for future audit requirements, the Delete option completely removes this FTA from the client’s history. This FTA will no longer be visible when choosing from the FTA dropdown menu in the top right corner. It is recommended that this option be used only for those FTAs created in error and to select one of the two above options for record keeping reasons.


In the top right corner of the page you can filter who the agreement is for, the status of the agreement and a list of the relevant agreements that you can move between.


Multiple Fixed Term Agreements

While the system does not allow you to hold both a joint and individual FTA, it is possible to have multiple FTAs active at the same level. This is offered by AdviceOS to allow for flexibility depending on how the Practice/Licensee wishes to approach the FTA process.


File Notes

You also have the ability to create a file note from the FTA page, which can be used to track relevant information related to the FTA. This file note will default the Type & Sub-type to ‘disclosure requirement’ and ‘fee disclosure statement’ respectively as default. You can upload the returned FTA as an attachment to this file note or upload it separately within the clients document section.


If you have any further questions, please reach out to the support team at info@midwinter.com.au or by calling 1300 882 938.







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