Service agreements are critical to keeping businesses running smoothly. Use this free service agreement template to get started.
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A service agreement is a legal document that outlines the terms of a service provided by one party (the service provider) to another (the client).
Also known as a general service contract, master services agreement, or a service level agreement, these agreements are used to define the scope of work, contract duration, compensation, and other terms and conditions.
Service agreements are widely adopted and can used in industries such as IT, consulting, marketing, and many more. This is because ‘services’ can be interpreted broadly to cover everything from software development to modelling, and beyond.
In fact, we even have some industry-specific service agreement templates for you below:
In this article we’ll be covering service agreements broadly, from how to write one to what a comprehensive service agreement template should include. But let’s start with when you should use a service agreement in the first place.
A service agreement is important because it protects the interests of both parties, ensuring that the service provider is paid for the service they deliver, and that the customer receives the level of service agreed upon.
By clearly outlining these specific and tangible expectations, a service agreement will also be referred to in the event of a contractual dispute or legal disagreement.
There are a few instances where you’ll need to use a service contract to protect your business. Here are a few examples:
When you hire a service provider, such as a consultant, IT professional, or marketing agency, they'll need to understand the scope of their work, the timeline, and how they will be compensated. A service agreement provides a clear and legally binding document that outlines these details.
If you're a service provider, you'll want to ensure that you have a clear agreement with your clients about the services you'll provide, the timeline, and your compensation. This protects you from potential disputes and ensures you get paid for your work - and on time.
For ongoing or long-term services, a service agreement can provide a framework that can be updated or amended as needed. This allows for flexibility while still maintaining a clear understanding of the terms of the service.
Service agreements often include service level agreements (SLAs), which define the level of service expected from the service provider. This can include things like response times, uptime for software products, quality of work, and other performance metrics.
Different teams and individuals will need to send out service agreements, depending on the nature of the service being provided and the recipients of that service.
These teams will often include:
However, if the company is big enough to have an in-house legal team, it will be the legal team that is tasked with owning and creating service agreement templates. They will typically have final approval rights over the final version on the agreement, too.
Your service agreement template needs to be comprehensive enough to cover a broad range of situations, offering your business the protections it needs and ensuring an appropriate value exchange with the customer.
A robust service agreement will include:
Now you know exactly what a service agreement template should include. But how do you turn that into a legally binding contract you can trust?
First, choose a well-structured service agreement template as your foundation. A good template provides a framework that includes all the essential clauses and sections, such as the scope of work, contract payment terms, confidentiality, and termination conditions. This helps you avoid overlooking critical components.
The scope of work is the heart of any service agreement. While a template will offer a basic outline, it’s crucial to customize this section to reflect the specific services set to be provided.
To do this, you’ll need to detail the tasks, deliverables, timelines, and responsibilities in precise terms, whether that’s software uptime or an excavation job.
Templates typically include generic payment terms, but these should be adapted to match the specifics of your arrangement.
Perhaps you want upfront payment for the service, or you want to charge for time and materials. Either way, it’s important to consider factors such as payment schedules, methods, and any additional costs like expenses or late fees.
These can be amended during contract negotiations, but it’s always worth getting off on the right foot with reasonable and detailed terms to begin with.
If the delivery of your service involves sensitive information, it’s also important to customize the confidentiality and data protection sections of the template.
To afford yourselves sufficient protection, be sure to specify what constitutes confidential information, how it should be handled, and the obligations of both parties regarding data security.
When drafting a new service agreement, ending that service is likely the last thing on your mind. But it’s important to define what constitutes grounds for termination of a contract, how much notice is required, and any penalties or procedures involved.
You can either prepare for these eventualities using a termination clause, or a full termination agreement.
Once you’ve customized the template to fit your needs, take the time to review the contract carefully. If you don’t have legal expertise yourself, it will be beneficial to have a legal professional review the customized agreement to ensure that it’s legally sound and that all bases are covered.
Unless you have a reliable contract management solution, the process will still prove challenging. It's admin-heavy and it involves a lot of back and forth, quickly becoming a burden for teams that are already buried in low-value admin work.
In particular, businesses encounter the following problems:
Luckily, your process doesn't have to have the pain points we just described. There's a faster and more efficient way to create service agreements. You can manage them end-to-end with Juro.
By managing your service agreements in a flexible and collaborative contract management solution like Juro, you can save time and streamline the process. Here’s how.
In most businesses, legal counsel will want to determine which clauses are used in a service agreement template, and when they are used.
With Juro's automated contract templates, in-house lawyers can comfortably define and control the terms of the service agreement.
These pre-approved templates can then be used by commercial teams to self-serve on contracts from the template without inviting contractual risk.
Sales reps simply use the Q&A flow on a service agreement template to enter key data in smart fields and watch the data auto-populate the contract to customize it. Or, they can watch the data move seamlessly from other business systems via an integration with CRMs like Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive.
Juro users can also collaborate on their service agreements in real time, with the ability to toggle seamlessly between internal and external commenting.
This means that contract owners can discuss the contract terms privately with their internal stakeholders and respond to counterparties' comments, suggestions and contract redlines without leaving the platform.
Once the service agreement is approved, it can be sent for signature. With our native eSignature solution, parties can sign the service agreement in seconds, from any device.
This removes the usual friction encountered with wet signatures from the signing process helps you to secure new clients faster and more efficiently.
Not only does Juro’s native eSignature functionality empower you to get contracts signed faster, but it’s also secure and holds validity in most geographies.
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The contract lifecycle doesn't end once a service agreement is signed. There are a few, important things you need to do to manage and track your contracts post-signature, too.
Juro makes all of this work easy by centralizing your contract storage and making all of your contracts fully searchable. With Juro's data-rich contract repository, it's easy to find, query and report on your service agreements.
You can even set automated contract reminders for your agreements, allowing you to track auto-renewal deadlines, termination dates, and upcoming contractual obligations.
Koombea, a US-based app development company, transformed their contracting process by switching to Juro, streamlining the way they agree service contracts.
Here’s how Nicolas Costa, Director of Customer Ops and Account Management at Koombea describes the value added by Juro:
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Want to find out how Juro can power service agreements for your business? Hit the button below to book a personalized demo.
A service agreement is a contract between a business that provides a service and the client that pays for it. It records what the provider will deliver and how it gets paid, along with how long the arrangement lasts and how either side can end it.
Usually, yes. Without one, there's no clear record of what was included in the price, so extra requests and late payments are much harder to resolve. A short agreement covering the scope and the fee protects both sides and takes little time to complete.
Many businesses use the terms loosely, and an MSA is one type of service agreement. A master services agreement sets the legal terms for an ongoing relationship once, and each new project is then agreed in a separate statement of work or order form. A standalone service agreement usually covers a single engagement, with the scope and the legal terms in one document.
It should be detailed enough that someone outside the deal could tell whether the work was done. List the deliverables and deadlines, and say what is excluded, because many disputes start when the client expects something the provider thinks costs extra. If the scope is likely to change, set out a simple process for pricing and approving changes in writing.
A service agreement usually lets either party end it with written notice, and allows a faster exit if the other side commits a serious breach it doesn't fix. Check how much notice is required and what happens to work in progress and unpaid invoices when the contract ends. Without a clear termination clause, ending the relationship can be slow and costly.
It works well as a starting point, but you'll get the most from it by tailoring the scope and payment terms to each engagement. Governing law matters too, so make sure the agreement names the right jurisdiction for both parties. For specific legal advice on your contract templates, consult an attorney.
Build the template in Juro once and let sales or procurement generate each service agreement from it, filling in the scope and fees for every client. When legal changes a standard position, it updates that one template and every new agreement follows. Signed agreements are stored together and can be searched for renewal dates and notice periods.
Yes. In Juro, Operator can build a new service agreement template from your existing contracts, picking up your drafting style and the positions you usually take on terms like liability and payment. That means the draft reflects your risk appetite, and your legal team approves it before anyone uses it.
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