Standing Rules Starter

Optional. It only appears at the top of your document, and it never leaves this page.

Pricing and scope

The first question in almost every project enquiry, and the one most expensive to answer badly in writing.

• Never quote a project price or timeline in writing from a description alone. Offer a discovery call first.A number given before you understand the work becomes the ceiling for the whole negotiation.
• A published starting-from range may be shared when someone asks directly.Some firms would rather filter out the £2k enquiry than run a call to discover it.
• Never offer, confirm, or negotiate a discount in writing.A discounted rate in an email becomes the rate for every renewal, and it gets forwarded.
• Never commit to a delivery date in writing before it exists in the schedule.A date given to be helpful is the one you get held to six weeks later.

Contracts and compliance

What a written reply must never attempt. These are the rules worth being strictest about.

• Contract, NDA and data-processing questions are never answered by a draft — a person sends the documents.An off-hand sentence about terms can be read as agreement to them.
• Never state a certification, compliance status or security posture in writing. A person answers those with the evidence attached.A helpful "yes, we’re SOC 2" that turns out to mean "in progress" is the kind of sentence that ends a deal or starts a dispute.
• Questions about who owns the work, IP assignment, liability or indemnity go to an owner unanswered.These have one correct answer per contract, and it is never the one improvised in an inbox.
• Never agree an SLA, uptime figure or guaranteed outcome in writing.A number in an email is the number you are measured against, whatever the contract says.

Live projects

The conversations that happen after the work has started, usually while you are mid-delivery.

• Scope questions on live projects go to the project lead, not a draft.Only the person doing the work knows what is already in scope.
• A scope change is acknowledged, never agreed, in a reply. Confirm receipt and say who will come back on it.Acknowledging costs nothing and buys the client a fast answer. Agreeing costs whatever the change costs.
• Never confirm a go-live or launch date that is not already agreed with the delivery team.Launch dates get forwarded to other people’s calendars within the hour.

Invoices and payment

Fill these in with your actual policy. The wording matters less than it being consistent.

• Never confirm, change or restate bank details or payment instructions in a reply. Payment details are confirmed by phone, to a known number.Invoice-redirection fraud works precisely because someone helpfully confirmed new details in writing.
• Any disputed invoice, refusal to pay, or mention of collections or a lawyer goes to an owner unanswered.A routine payment chase and a dispute need opposite tones, and only a person can tell which one this is.
• Quote payment terms verbatim from the engagement letter. Do not paraphrase them.Paraphrased terms are the ones that get argued about.

Voice and sign-off

The part that makes a draft sound like you rather than like software.

• Open with the sender’s first name. Never "Dear Client" or "Hi there".The fastest tell that a reply was not written for the person reading it.
• At most one exclamation mark per reply.Enthusiasm punctuation is the most common reason a draft reads as automated.
• Sign off with the firm name unless the sender wrote to a named person.Keeps continuity when whoever replies next is someone else.

When a human takes over

The catch-all. Worth writing even if it feels obvious.

• If it is unclear whether a message carries contractual weight, treat it as though it does and route it to a person.The ambiguous cases are exactly the ones where guessing is expensive.
• Never name a client, offer a reference, or share a case study without asking that client first.It volunteers somebody else’s name and contact details, which is not yours to do — and a reference invented to be helpful is worse.
• Any complaint, or any mention of a refund or a lawyer, goes to an owner unanswered.The first reply to a complaint sets the tone for everything after it.
• Press, partnership, recruiter and supplier enquiries are never answered from the front desk.Cheap to route, awkward to undo.

Your own rules

The ones nobody else would think of. These are usually the most useful lines in the finished document.

What this is, and what it is not

It is a communication policy: who says what, in writing, on behalf of your business. It is a starting point that expects to be edited, not a finished document, and it is not legal, financial or clinical advice. The lines about contracts, money and clinical questions are about routing them to a person, never about answering them.

This is the same document we build with you during the pilot, from your own real enquiries rather than from a checkbox list. You keep that one whether you continue or not. This is just the version you can have today, for nothing.

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