Customizing your contract terms

Your contract clauses come from your industry catalog in Settings. Start from BookNox's defaults, then tune them to your real policies, and every proposal you create afterward uses your version. A few parts are set by BookNox for each trade and do not change; this article lists both.

Terms for every trade

Every catalog lets you set these terms:

• Deposit percentage, from 5% to 50% (weddings always use four 25% milestones, and web design always takes 50% first)
• Cancellation window, from 0 to 365 days before the service date
• Travel: the miles included free and the per mile rate beyond them
• Your business state in your profile, which tailors the contract to state consumer rules where BookNox has them (California and New York, for example); leave it blank for the universal terms

How does the cancellation window work?

The cancellation window decides what a client owes if they cancel. In the standard contract, the deposit reserves the date and is earned on signing. A client who cancels more than the window's number of days before the service date owes nothing beyond the deposit. A client who cancels inside the window owes the greater of the deposit or your reasonable actual losses, never more than the total fee.

Here is the default in practice. With a 30 day window, a client who cancels 45 days out owes only the deposit they already paid; a client who cancels 10 days out may owe more, up to your documented losses. Wedding and web design contracts use their own cancellation terms built around their milestone schedules.

Clauses for your trade

Each trade's catalog adds its own settings:

• DJs: an overtime rate for sets that run long, and a switch for live bands or acts, which swaps in live performance terms
• Venues: a damage deposit and an alcohol policy (guests bring their own with a licensed bartender, in house bar service only, or no alcohol permitted)
• Florists: a delivery radius with delivery included
• Officiants: how many custom script revision rounds are included
• Caterers: how many days before the event the headcount locks
• Doulas: the prenatal and postpartum visits included
• Life coaches and tutors: the default session length, plus sessions per week for tutors
• Virtual assistants: a response time in business hours and an overflow hourly rate
• Videographers: an opt in drone clause, which adds FAA Part 107 and drone insurance language only when you turn it on
• Photographers: an optional reschedule clause with a notice period, a late reschedule fee, the number of free reschedules, and the window for a new date

Sources, read October 22, 2026: FAA: flying a drone for work under Part 107; 14 CFR Part 107: the federal rule for small drones.

The photographer reschedule fee

The reschedule clause appears in a photography contract only when you set a reschedule notice period in Settings. The late fee a contract states can never exceed that proposal's own deposit: BookNox lowers it to the deposit when a proposal is created, and the new proposal form shows the lowered figure when it differs. Settings also refuses a fee above the deposit on your highest priced package, since that is almost always a typo.

Can I change terms for one client only?

Some details are set per proposal rather than in the catalog. The new proposal form asks for them when they apply: whether a second shooter is included for photography, the service tier, rehearsal dinner coordination, and day of staff count for wedding planning, the set hours for DJs, the menu tier and guaranteed headcount for catering, the support type for doulas, the sessions in a coaching package, the hours per month for virtual assistants, and the subject for tutoring.

Overtime and damage deposits

Overtime rates and damage deposits are contract terms, not payments BookNox collects. The DJ overtime rate tells the client what an extra hour costs, and the venue damage deposit states what the client is responsible for, but neither is added to the payment schedule. Collect them with the client directly under the contract's terms.

Fixed sections

Some sections are set by BookNox for each trade: liability, indemnification, governing law and disputes, general provisions, and the electronic signature section. The force majeure clause is fixed too. For weddings, officiants, venues, and florists it also covers pandemic and government assembly restrictions and applies amounts already paid to a rescheduled date within 12 months; web design has its own version focused on timelines.

When do changes take effect?

Edits apply to proposals you create after the change. BookNox freezes the contract text into each proposal when it is created, so proposals already sent or signed keep exactly the terms the client was shown. To give an existing client new terms, send them a new proposal.

Having your terms reviewed

BookNox's contract templates are a starting point written for each trade, not legal advice for your business. Whether they suit your state and the way you work is a question for your own attorney, especially before you move the cancellation window or the deposit far from the defaults. Clients see the final text in the terms section of every proposal, so read one of your own proposals from start to finish before you send the first.