Preview. Contracts & Payments is live with a small set of customers. If you’d like to use it at your venue, reach out and we’ll get you set up.
Contracts & Payments
Paloma Documents are how you send the paperwork and the money for an event. Event agreements (sometimes called contracts), menu preorders, deposits, BEOs, final invoices: all of it now lives on the inquiry, alongside the email thread and the event details.
A document can include any combination of terms, a menu, form fields, a signature, and a payment. The simplest case is a single Pay button with nothing else. The full case is a complete BEO with line-by-line pricing, a signed contract, and a deposit. Most venues’ documents land somewhere in between.
This page covers what you can put in a document, what guests see when they open one, and how your team manages them from the dashboard.
Starting Points
Paloma ships with four templates as starting points. Edit them to match your venue, or build your own from scratch.
| Template | What’s in it |
|---|---|
| Standard Event Agreement | Your terms and a signature |
| Catering & Venue Agreement | Menu pick lists, totals with tax and service, signature, deposit |
| Private Dining Agreement | Menu pick lists, dietary and AV form fields, totals with tax and gratuity, signature, deposit |
| Payment Request | A Pay button. That’s it. |
Manage your templates at app.palomaparties.com/org/document-templates.
You can also attach a document to any inquiry, booked or not. Sending a menu preorder or quote with a deposit to a prospect who’s still deciding is a common way to firm up a lead.
How It Works
You or your event manager creates a document with the terms, prices, menu items, or anything else you want a guest to see and agree to. When you’re ready, you send it.
Once sent, the document is locked. The guest can supply what you’ve asked for (a signature, a dietary note, a menu pick), but the structure and your terms are fixed: the version the guest signs is the version preserved. They sign to ceremonially agree.
Documents are built from sections: intro text, event details, terms, menus, form fields, totals, signature, payment. Start from one of the seeded templates and adjust whatever you need.
What the Guest Sees
The guest gets an email with a link. They click through to a mobile-friendly web page (no login, no app to install) showing:
- A friendly intro from your venue
- Their event details
- Anything they need to review, pick, or fill in
- The total and what’s due now
- A signature pad and/or a Pay button when it’s time
When they sign, we capture their name, the time, and a snapshot of exactly what they agreed to. When they pay, they’re handed off to a secure checkout page hosted by your payment processor. They get a confirmation email with the signed PDF and a receipt, and they can come back to the link any time to see both.
What Your Team Sees
On any inquiry, the Documents tab shows everything sent for that event and where each one stands.
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Draft | You started it but haven’t sent it yet |
| Sent | Link is out. The guest hasn’t opened it yet |
| Viewed | The guest has opened the link |
| Signed | The guest signed (when a signature was required) |
| Paid | The guest paid |
| Completed | All required steps are done |
| Voided | You cancelled the document. The link still loads but shows a voided notice |
Every document row has an actions menu:
- Copy Link, to share the guest’s link by another channel
- View Document, to open the hosted page yourself
- Download PDF, including the signed version once it’s signed
- Edit Draft, only on drafts (see below for why)
- Duplicate, to start a new document from this one
- Save as Template, to turn this document into a reusable template
- Send Now, to send a draft
- Resend, to re-deliver the email to the guest
- Void, to cancel an unsigned, unpaid document
You’ll get a notification when a document is viewed, signed, or paid, so you don’t have to refresh the dashboard to know what’s happening.
Templates
Most venues send the same handful of documents over and over. Templates let you build those once and reuse them.
A few things worth knowing:
- Save any document as a template. If you ship a one-off document that ends up being worth reusing, the Save as Template action turns it into one.
- Duplicate templates to make a variant without losing the original.
- Templates are snapshotted into each document at the moment of use. Updating a template later doesn’t change documents you’ve already sent. The version the guest agreed to is the version preserved.
Who can edit a template?
Two people can change or delete a template:
- The teammate who created it. Templates remember who built them. The creator can always come back to adjust, rename, or delete.
- An admin at your organization. Org admins can edit and delete any template, including ones built by teammates who have since moved on.
Everyone else with template access can use a template or duplicate it into their own copy, but can’t change the original. The Duplicate action gives you a working copy you fully own.
Finer-grained visibility (“just me” while drafting, or templates fenced to specific venues in a multi-brand organization) is coming. Reach out if that matters for your setup.
Payments
You’ll connect your payment processor once, and every document with a Pay button uses it from then on. Paloma supports Stripe and Square.
| Stripe | Square | |
|---|---|---|
| Setup | Connect through Paloma. We create a connected Stripe account in your name and walk you through onboarding | Connect through Paloma with your existing Square login |
| Checkout | Stripe’s hosted checkout page | Square’s hosted payment page |
| Currencies | CAD and USD | CAD and USD |
| Where the money goes | Direct to your Stripe account on your normal payout schedule | Direct to your Square account on your normal payout schedule |
| Refunds | Issued from your Stripe dashboard | Issued from your Square dashboard |
Set up or change your processor at app.palomaparties.com/org/payments.
Each document can collect a full payment, a percentage deposit (e.g. 50%), a fixed deposit (e.g. $1,000 every event), or up to an amount (e.g. 25%, capped at $2,500). The payment rule lives on the document, so you can use one approach across every event or vary it case by case.
Common Questions
Why can’t I edit a document after I send it?
Once a document is sent, it’s locked. The reason is signing: if a guest signs the document, the exact content needs to be preserved in the audit trail and on the signed PDF. If we let you keep editing after sending, the version the guest agreed to could drift out from under them.
If you need to change something material, Void the document and send a new one (use Duplicate to start from the original). Drafts are fully editable until you click Send.
Can I save a document as a draft and come back to it?
Yes. Every document is a draft until you send it. You can close the editor, come back tomorrow, hand it to a teammate, whatever. Edit Draft is on the document row in the inquiry’s Documents tab.
Can I void a document I’ve already sent?
Yes, as long as it hasn’t been signed or paid. Open the actions menu on the document and choose Void. The link stays live but shows a voided notice, and the document can’t be signed or paid. If the guest had already paid before you needed to cancel, refund from your Stripe or Square dashboard.
Do guests need to create an account?
No. They click the link in the email and the document opens. No login, no password, no app.
Where do I see what a guest signed?
Every signed document generates a PDF with the signature, the timestamp, and the exact content the guest agreed to. Download PDF is in the document’s actions menu. Guests get a copy by email too.
Can I use my own contract language?
Yes. Your terms are your terms. Paloma doesn’t impose template language. We can help you turn an existing contract into a Paloma template the first time, and after that you can edit it freely.
What about taxes, gratuity, and fees?
The Totals section handles tax and gratuity. You can add percentage-based items (like 13% HST or 18% gratuity) or flat fees (like a $200 admin fee), and you can stack them so something like gratuity is calculated before tax. Each line shows up separately so guests see exactly what they’re paying for.
Can I send a document to a prospect who hasn’t booked yet?
Yes. Documents attach to any inquiry. Sending a menu preorder or a quote with a deposit is a common way to firm up a lead.
Why This Matters
One link to the guest. One signed PDF in the dashboard. Deposits in your processor on your usual payout schedule. The inquiry, the document, and the money all live on the same event, so your team isn’t copy-pasting details between tools or hunting down which version the guest actually signed.
For your guest, it’s even simpler: open a link, review, sign, pay. No account, no app, no friction between “yes, we’d love to host” and “we’re booked.”
Getting Started
Contracts & Payments is self-serve. To get going:
- If you’d like to use payments, connect your processor at app.palomaparties.com/org/payments. Pick Stripe or Square (whichever you already use or want to use) and follow the prompts. Skip this step if your first document is just an agreement.
- Open any inquiry, go to the Documents tab, and create your first document from one of the starting templates.
- Edit, send, done.
If you’d like us to walk through it with you the first time, we’re happy to. Reach out and we’ll find time. Otherwise, dive in.
Any questions? Email us at contact@palomaparties.com or book a meeting with us.