# Retainers

A retainer is a project you bill with a **fixed fee per month**. The fee can stand alone, or cover a
**contingent of hours**, with the hours beyond it billed on top. docket doesn't ask you to pick a
"project type": a retainer is a switch on the project, and the same project can still have
quotations and invoices by effort beside it.

## Setting it up

In the project's form (when you create it, or later under **Settings**), switch on
**This project is a retainer** and enter:

- **Billed**: **Monthly** or **Quarterly**. A quarter is three months, counted from the month the
  retainer starts in: a start in August means August to October, then November to January.
- **Monthly fee** or **Quarterly fee**: net, for one billing period.
- **Starts on** and, if the contract has one, **Ends on**. Without an end it runs until you set one.
- **Notice period** in months, if you want docket to show until when notice must be given.
- **Bill hours beyond the contingent**: on by default.

Under **Contingent** you enter how many hours the fee covers, per month or per quarter. Left
empty, the project's **budget** stands in when it is **Hours per month** (for a quarter, three
months of it). Without either, the fee is all that is billed.

## What each month shows

Under **Controlling** the project lists its months: the hours booked, the contingent, what is over
and what was left. **Unused hours lapse**: every month starts at zero, nothing is carried over.

Only time on billable services counts.

## The month's invoice

docket bills in arrears. Once a month or a quarter is over, the project's **Accounting** tab and the workspace's
**Accounting** overview show it as due, with **Create invoice draft**. The draft holds:

- one line with the **monthly fee**, under a position that names the month;
- with a contingent whose overage is billed: a second position with the **hours beyond it**, one
  line per time entry at the project's rates. The entry that crosses the contingent is billed with
  the part beyond it.

It is a draft like any other: change it, add lines, then publish it. Its delivery date is the last
day of the month. The month's time entries now belong to this invoice and are locked, so they
aren't billed again by effort (see [Billing by effort](https://docket.rocks/en/docs/billing-cycle#billing-by-effort)).
Delete the draft or cancel the invoice, and the month is due again.

A retainer that starts or ends in the middle of a month is billed with the **full fee** for that
month. Change the amount in the draft if you agreed otherwise.

## In the forecast

Every month of the term that has no invoice yet counts in the **Forecast** with its fee, in that
month, as confirmed revenue not yet invoiced. Once the month has its invoice, the invoice counts
instead. An open-ended retainer counts to the end of the year shown.

## Changing a retainer along the way

- **A new fee** applies to the drafts you create from then on. Invoices already written stay.
- **Switching it on later**, with a start in the past, makes every month since then due. Create
  the drafts you want and delete the rest, or set the start to the first month you want to bill.
- **Setting an end**, or switching the retainer off, stops further months. What was invoiced stays.
- **Switching from monthly to quarterly** (or back) counts the periods anew from the start. Months
  that already have an invoice are unknown to the new count: set the start to the first month that
  isn't billed yet.
- **Changing the contingent** (or the budget that stands in for it) applies to every month that has no invoice yet: past
  months are counted against the new figure.

Related: [The billing cycle](https://docket.rocks/en/docs/billing-cycle) · [Projects, services and customers](https://docket.rocks/en/docs/services-customers-projects)