Signing the Line: Contracts and Forms in Virtual Assistance

One of the most important parts of becoming involved with a virtual assistant is making sure that the final offers are clear.  This means that all of the contract work and forms should be understood and signed by both sides.  This will prevent any problems from occurring later on, and will help to define all of the terms of services that you need.

There are a variety of forms that a virtual assistant may decide to use, all which will make a difference in the type of services that are negotiated between you and the virtual assistant.  The first of these that you may see is a retainer agreement.  Basically, this will let you know what the work is and will define what the important aspects of the work will be, whether long term or just with a project.

If you are only working with the virtual assistant with one project, you may be looking at different forms.  Most likely, a per-project agreement will be looked at, which will define the terms and conditions of the project.  Most likely, this will be signed once a year, and will be used if you are only using the virtual assistant occasionally.

From this point, you may also be signing other alternative agreements.  Confidentiality agreements may be important to consider if you have the virtual assistant working with paperwork in your office.  Non-solicitation and non-competition agreements can also be looked over with a virtual assistant.  This will ensure that a virtual assistant that only works with you every once in a while won’t go and tell someone else what your business is doing, causing you to be in conflict with competition.

Depending on the type of work you will need from the virtual assistant, you will want to make sure that you have the proper forms to sign.  Having the agreements clear and legal between you and the virtual assistant will help you to make sure that everything is done correctly from the beginning to the assistance that you need.