FAQ

Questions we get asked.

Getting started

How long does setup take?: About two hours of your time, spread over a week or so. We do the work — extracting your scope library from past letters, tagging your Word template, reviewing your rate card — and you review and approve it.
Do we have to rebuild our scope library from scratch?: No. That is the single most common reason tools like this go unused, so we removed it. Send us five to twenty past fee letters and we extract the clauses, assumptions and exclusions in your exact wording. Nothing goes live until someone at your firm approves it.
Can we use our existing Word template?: Yes, and you should. We merge into it, so what your client receives looks like what they have always received.
What if our letters differ between directors?: That is normal and it is part of what the library fixes. We extract the variants, you decide which become the firm standard, and the rest stay available as alternatives.

Do we need to replace Abtrac, Synergy or Deltek?: No. FeeLetter is not a practice management system and is not trying to become one. It sits alongside whatever you use.
Does it work for engineers as well as architects?: Yes. Stage sets ship for architecture, structural and civil engineering, town planning and building surveying, and you can edit them.
What about multi-discipline practices?: A single proposal can span disciplines, each with its own stages and clauses, summing into one fee.
Does it handle sub-consultants?: Yes, with an optional coordination fee and an explicit GST treatment on each.
What about lump sum versus percentage fees?: Any stage can be switched from hourly to a lump sum or a percentage of construction cost. Building surveyors and certifiers can price from a published fee schedule instead of hours entirely.

Where is our data stored?: AWS in Sydney (ap-southeast-2). All of it, including document processing. Nothing leaves Australia.
Who at FeeLetter can see our fees?: Nobody, casually. Support access requires an impersonation session with a typed reason, expires after 60 minutes, and emails your owner that it happened.
Can our staff see cost rates?: Only owners and admins. The values are removed server-side, so they never reach an author’s browser.
What happens to our data if we cancel?: Export everything yourself at any time. We retain it for 90 days after cancellation and then purge it.
Is it Privacy Act compliant?: It is built to the Australian Privacy Principles, including self-serve access (APP 12) and destruction (APP 11), and we operate under the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme.

What does it cost?: From $450 per month for practices up to ten staff, plus a one-off setup engagement from $4,000. Full detail on the pricing page.
Is there a contract?: Monthly. No lock-in beyond the current month.
What counts as an author seat?: Anyone who creates or edits a fee letter. People who only read them are free and unlimited.
Is the setup fee negotiable?: No. It pays for a person doing real work — extracting your library, configuring your template, reviewing your rate card. Discounting it would mean doing less of it, and doing less of it is how these tools end up unused.

Does it e-sign?: Not yet. Most firms already have DocuSign or print and sign, so it was not worth delaying launch for.
Does it track project actuals?: Not yet. Fee-versus-actual analysis is the natural next step and needs your practice management data, which is a later phase.
Does it integrate with our CRM?: Not yet. HubSpot and Xero integrations are on the roadmap, deliberately after the core product is proven.
Does it use AI to set our fees?: No, and it will not. The fee comes from your rate card and your hours, and every figure traces back to both. The only AI in the product drafts a project understanding paragraph, which you edit or discard.

Something we have not answered?