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Know an assignment is ending while you can still do something

Every live contract is tracked against its end date and its notice period. When one crosses into the window you set, the extension conversation is drafted to the client with the contractor, the role and the dates already in it — early enough that the answer changes something.

Start freeSee how it works

Live contracts — term elapsed

31 running · 5 in window

  • D. Okonkwo

    Wexley Group

    22 of 26 weeks

    Ends 29 Aug

    Nobody has asked. Four weeks left and he has a call booked with another agency.

  • S. Bright

    Calder Rail

    18 of 24 weeks

    Ends 19 Sep

    Client mentioned wanting her through the cutover. Never confirmed in writing.

  • A. Whitlock

    Northgate Logistics

    9 of 26 weeks

    Ends 14 Nov

    Outside the window. Nothing needed yet.

  • T. Aduba

    Calder Rail

    25 of 26 weeks

    Ends 15 Aug

    One week out, no extension raised. This one is already a problem.

Every one of these was known months ago. The end date was in the record the day the contract was signed. It just wasn't in front of anyone.

Works with

  • Google Sheets
  • Excel
  • Google Calendar
  • Gmail
  • Outlook
  • Slack

It works off the assignment record you already keep — the sheet with start dates, end dates and rates in it. No ATS is needed and none would help here: not one of them publishes a trigger, and an end date three weeks away isn't an event anyway, it's a date you have to be watching for.

The chore

How this goes right now

  1. An end date is the one piece of information on a contract desk that is known perfectly, months ahead, and acted on late anyway. It was written down the day the assignment was signed. It has not moved since. And it still arrives as a surprise, because nothing puts it in front of anybody until the contractor mentions that next Friday is their last day.

  2. By then the conversation has changed shape entirely. Ask a client for an extension six weeks out and you're a supplier managing continuity — there's time for them to raise a requisition, get budget signed, extend the PO. Ask them six days out and you're a problem arriving at their desk, and the honest answer is often that they'd have said yes a month ago but procurement now takes three weeks and the contractor can't sit idle waiting.

  3. Meanwhile that contractor has done the maths themselves. Anyone good, two months from the end of an assignment with nobody having mentioned what happens next, starts taking calls. They aren't being disloyal — they're being sensible, because silence reads as an ending. And the desk loses a running placement with a known margin, which is the most expensive thing a contract desk can lose, because replacing it costs a full search to get back to where it already was.

The difference

Same end dates, surfaced while they're still useful

Nothing here is new information. It's information you already hold, arriving at the point where acting on it is still possible.

Remembering it yourself
Surfaced at your notice window
End dates known for months and noticed in the final fortnight
Every live contract tracked against its own end date and notice period
The ask made when procurement no longer has time to say yes
The client conversation drafted while there's runway to act on it
Contractors taking other calls because nobody mentioned what's next
One view of what's ending, in date order, with nothing hidden
Verbal 'we'll definitely keep her' never confirmed in writing
Verbal agreements chased into something written
Renewals lost that both sides actually wanted
The contractor told where things stand before they wonder

Try it

Walk through it yourself

This is the actual shape of the workflow — the same trigger, the same steps, the same draft waiting for your say-so. Click through it.

Chase contract extensions

Scheduled checkGoogle Sheets

Weekly runway check, Monday 08:00

Reads every live assignment against its end date and works out which have crossed into the notice window you set — six weeks by default, and adjustable per client because procurement moves at different speeds in different companies.

What it does

  1. Read live assignments and work out the runway on each

    31 contracts running. 5 inside a six-week window, 1 inside two weeks. 26 outside it and deliberately left alone.

    Google Sheets

  2. Check whether the extension has already been discussed

    Searched the thread with each client. Calder confirmed Bright verbally on 14 Jul but never in writing. No mention of Okonkwo anywhere in six months of correspondence.

    Gmail

  3. Look for a conversation already in the diary

    No review booked with Wexley. A monthly catch-up with Calder Rail sits on 12 Aug — the Bright extension can be raised there rather than as a separate email.

    Google Calendar

  4. Draft the openers, one per client, in the right register

    Two drafts. Wexley gets a fresh ask on Okonkwo with dates and rate. Calder gets a short note confirming the Bright conversation in writing and an agenda line for the 12th.

    Gmail

Draft email — nothing has been sent

To
alan.brightwell@wexleygroup.example
Subject
Dara Okonkwo — assignment ends 29 August

Hi Alan,

Dara's current assignment on the platform team runs to Friday 29 August. I wanted to raise it now rather than closer to the date, since I know a requisition on your side takes a few weeks to get through.

If you'd like to keep him on, the simplest route is a further 13 weeks at the current rate, which would take him to 28 November and through the migration you mentioned in July. Happy to look at a shorter extension if that fits the budget cycle better.

If the work is finishing, that's completely fine — just let me know either way and I'll plan around it. It's easier for everyone if Dara knows where he stands with a few weeks to go.

Best,

Send the Wexley ask and the Calder confirmation?

These are the drafts most likely to need your hand on them, and that's expected. You know whether Alan responds better to a direct ask or a soft one, and whether now is the week to mention the rate. The dates, names and runway are done; the judgement is yours.

Once you approveSlack

Raised early, with the runway visible to the desk

The emails go from your mailbox in your words. The assignment is marked as raised with the date, so next Monday's check doesn't ask again. If there's no reply within the window you set, it comes back to you rather than sending a second email — a client who hasn't answered about an extension usually needs a call, not another message.

Six weeks of warning instead of six days.

It drafts the opener and hands you the runway. The conversation with the client is still a conversation you have.

Start free

How it works

What it's actually doing

Watching dates you already recorded, and starting the conversation early enough that the answer can still be acted on.

  1. 1
    • Google Sheets
    • ExExcel

    Tracks every live assignment against its own end date

    Read from your placement record. Notice windows can differ per client, because a company where procurement takes a month needs a longer run-up than one where a manager can just say yes.

  2. 2
    • Gmail
    • OuOutlook

    Checks whether it's already been discussed

    Searches the thread with that client before drafting anything. Asking a manager for an extension they agreed to three weeks ago makes you look like you weren't listening.

  3. 3
    • Google Calendar

    Uses a meeting you already have

    If there's a catch-up in the diary before the window closes, it suggests raising it there instead of sending another email into a busy inbox.

  4. 4
    • Gmail
    • OuOutlook
    • Slack

    Drafts the ask, and chases the verbal ones into writing

    A fresh conversation and a confirm-what-we-agreed note are different emails. Both get drafted; neither gets sent without you.

You stay in control

It starts the conversation. It never negotiates one.

An extension is a commercial discussion about rate, duration and whether a client still needs someone. That belongs to you entirely. What it does is make sure the discussion happens while it can still go your way — and then gets out of the way.

  1. Step one

    It drafts

  2. Step two — you

    You read it and approve

  3. Step three

    Only then does it send

It doesn't agree terms

No rate is offered, accepted or adjusted on your behalf. The draft proposes continuing at the current rate because that's the neutral opener; changing it is a conversation you have, in your own words.

It never contacts the contractor about their future

Telling someone their assignment may be ending is a phone call from their consultant. It will flag to you that they should be told. It will not tell them.

No reply is escalated to you, not chased again

Silence on an extension means something — budget frozen, a manager avoiding it, a decision above their head. Another email doesn't solve any of those. It comes back to you to pick up the phone.

It won't quietly assume a renewal

A verbal yes stays flagged as unconfirmed until something written exists. Marking a contract as extended on the strength of a corridor conversation is how a contractor turns up on Monday to no purchase order.

Setup

What setting this up involves

  1. 1

    Connect

    • Google Sheets or Excel, holding your live assignment record
    • Gmail or Outlook, so it can check what's already been discussed
    • Google Calendar, to spot a client meeting already booked
    • Slack, if you want the weekly runway posted to the desk
  2. 2

    Tell it how you work

    • Where your live assignments live, and which columns hold start and end dates
    • Your default notice window, and any client that needs a longer one
    • Whether to propose a duration in the opener or leave it open
    • How long to wait for a reply before bringing it back to you
    • Which clients you'd rather raise in a meeting than by email
  3. 3

    Then it runs

    About 25 minutes, once

    The shortest setup on this desk, because the data already exists — it's the end-date column you've been keeping all along. Most of the time goes on deciding your notice window, and six weeks is a sensible starting answer.

Edge cases

Where it's careful, and what it won't do

What it handles

  • An extension already agreed but never papered

    A verbal yes in an old email thread is recognised, and the draft becomes a short confirmation rather than a fresh ask. Different email, different job — but it still needs sending.

  • Clients whose procurement is slow

    The notice window is per client. Somewhere that needs a requisition, three approvals and a new PO gets ten weeks; somewhere a manager can extend on the spot gets four.

  • A contract that's already been extended once

    It reads the current end date, not the original. A second extension conversation is a different one from the first, and the draft acknowledges the assignment has already run longer than planned.

  • A rolling contract with no fixed end

    Rolling assignments are tracked on review dates instead of end dates, so they don't sit permanently outside the window and never get looked at.

What it does not do

  • Negotiate rate or terms

    It opens the conversation at the existing rate. Any change to what you charge is a commercial decision made by a person who knows the account.

  • Tell the contractor anything

    Nothing is sent to the person on assignment. If their contract is at risk, they hear it from you, on the phone, before they hear it anywhere else.

  • Extend or amend a contract

    It drafts an email. Contract paperwork, purchase orders and signatures happen where they happen today, with the same people signing them.

  • Chase a silent client indefinitely

    One ask, then it stops and comes to you. A client who hasn't replied about an extension is telling you something that a follow-up email won't fix.

Time back

One saved renewal pays for the year

Time back
1–3 renewals a year
Spent on
Keeping placements that were never at risk
What it costs
$49 / monthGrowthplan — see what’s included

How that’s worked out: Based on a desk running 25–35 live contracts, where end dates cluster and two or three a year lapse for no commercial reason — the client wanted the contractor, the contractor was happy, and the ask was simply made too late for procurement to turn it round. A single 13-week extension retained is worth more than the tooling costs in a year, which is why this page measures renewals rather than hours.

Fair questions

The questions contract desks ask first

We know our contracts. Is this solving a problem we actually have?

You know the ones ending this month. The question is whether you know the ones ending in nine weeks, on the desk's thirty-first contract, on a Tuesday when two placements are going wrong. Desks don't lose renewals through ignorance — they lose them because attention goes to whatever is loudest, and a contract with six weeks left is never the loudest thing in the room until it has six days left.

Won't asking early make the client think about ending it?

It's a fair worry and worth being honest about: raising it does force a decision that silence postpones. But the decision is coming regardless, and the version where you ask early is the one where a yes is still deliverable. The version where you wait is the one where the client would have said yes but procurement can't turn it round in time — and that outcome looks identical to a no while costing you the same placement.

Our assignment data isn't clean enough for this to work.

It needs one thing to be right: the end date. Rates, notes and client contacts make the drafts better, but the mechanism only depends on knowing when each contract finishes. If that column is reliable, this works today. If it isn't, that's worth fixing on its own merits, because an end date nobody trusts is a renewal nobody chases.

More off the same desk

Other things that keep falling off the list

The same problem in other industries

FAQ

Questions worth answering properly

How far ahead does it flag a contract?

Whatever window you set, defaulting to six weeks, and it can differ per client. The right number is however long that particular company takes to raise a requisition and issue a purchase order — four weeks somewhere a manager can just decide, ten somewhere with a procurement function.

Does it email the contractor about their own assignment?

Never. Nothing goes to the person on placement. If the assignment is at risk, that's a phone call from their consultant, and it should reach them before they work it out from the silence. It will remind you that the call is due.

What if we already agreed the extension verbally?

It searches the thread with that client first, and where an agreement exists but nothing written followed, the draft becomes a short confirmation rather than a fresh ask. Verbal extensions that were never papered are one of the more common ways a contractor arrives on Monday without a valid PO.

Can it handle rolling contracts with no end date?

Yes, tracked on a review date instead. Otherwise rolling assignments sit permanently outside every window and get looked at less often than fixed-term ones, which is the wrong way round — a rolling contract is the easiest of all for a client to end without much notice.

Does it propose a rate increase at extension?

Not on its own. The default opener continues at the current rate, because that's the version most likely to get a fast yes. Whether to move the rate is a commercial judgement about that client and that contractor, and it's yours to make in the draft before you send it.

What happens if the client doesn't reply?

It comes back to you rather than sending again. Silence on an extension usually means a frozen budget, a decision sitting above the person you emailed, or a manager avoiding an awkward answer — and none of those are solved by a second email arriving in the same inbox.

Stop losing renewals you were always going to win

Point it at your assignment sheet and set a notice window. Monday's check tells you what's ending while there's still time to do something about it.

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