Engagements
How engagements work.
The steps from first inquiry to ongoing management, the three ways to engage SPL, and what shapes the scope and fee in your written proposal.
The sequence
From first note to ongoing management.
Each step has a clear output, and nothing moves to paid work until both sides have signed.
- 1. Inquiry. You send a short note through the consultation form or to [email protected]. You receive a personal reply within two business days. Please do not send licenses, financial records, or other sensitive documents at this stage.
- 2. Fit call. A call of about 30 minutes to talk through your business, locations, and obligations, and where the strain is. It is a fit discussion, not an assessment: no records are reviewed and no findings are given.
- 3. Written proposal. If the fit is right, you receive a written proposal setting out the scope, deliverables, reporting, responsibilities on both sides, and the fee.
- 4. Signed discovery scope. Work begins only when both sides sign. The discovery assessment is quoted as its own project with a defined scope and end.
- 5. Assessment. We review your records, interview the people who carry the work today, and look at the sites in scope. You receive written findings and priorities in plain language.
- 6. Management plan. From the findings, we agree a plan with you: the calendar, the procedures to write or update, the owners of each task, the reporting cadence, and what sits outside scope.
- 7. Ongoing management. If you continue, we run the plan for a fixed monthly fee, report on the agreed schedule, and adjust as regulations and your business change. Changes to scope are agreed in writing.
For how each step works in practice, see our process and your first 30 days.
Three ways to engage
Discovery, ongoing management, or a one-time project.
An engagement usually starts with a discovery assessment. Ongoing management builds on it. A one-time project can follow it, or stand on its own when the work is already clearly defined. Each is scoped and priced separately.
01
Discovery assessment
A defined project that gives you a written picture of where the business stands before anyone commits to ongoing work.
What it is for
- Owners who want a written baseline of their licenses, obligations, records, procedures, and properties
- Deciding what needs attention first, and whether ongoing management makes sense
- Operators taking over a location, adding a site, or preparing for a change in ownership who need the current state documented
Typical deliverables
- An inventory of the licenses, permits, leases, and reporting obligations in scope
- A findings summary with priorities and recommended actions (see the sample)
- A draft compliance calendar built from what the review found
- Items that need legal, tax, or insurance input, listed separately for your professionals
- A recommended management plan and scope, if you want to continue
What you are responsible for
- Providing the records requested, or telling us where they are held
- Making owners and key staff available for interviews
- Arranging site access for any visits in scope
- Telling us about known issues, open notices, and pending inspections
- Deciding what to act on. Findings are recommendations; decisions stay with you
02
Ongoing management
The agreed plan, run month after month for a fixed monthly fee, with reporting on a schedule you agree in advance.
What it is for
- Keeping the calendar, procedures, records, vendors, and properties in scope maintained after the plan is agreed
- Giving owners one point of contact and a regular written view of what is done, due, and waiting on a decision
Typical deliverables
- A maintained compliance calendar with owners and start-by dates
- Written reports on the agreed cadence, such as a monthly owner report
- New and updated procedures as the business or the rules change
- Corrective actions tracked from finding to verified close
- Monitoring of regulatory changes in the jurisdictions in scope, with interpretation questions passed to your counsel
- Site and standards reviews at the frequency set in the proposal
- If the engagement ends, a handback of the calendar, current procedures, and organized records
What you are responsible for
- Timely decisions on the items we raise
- Access to the systems, records, and people the work depends on
- Your staff completing the tasks assigned to them
- Signing and submitting filings as the license holder
- Keeping your counsel, accountant, and broker relationships in place
- Telling us about changes: a new site, an ownership change, a key departure, or a notice from a regulator
03
One-time projects
A defined piece of work, quoted as a project with a clear end, that can stand on its own or sit alongside ongoing management.
What it is for
- Preparing the documents for a license application, renewal, or change filing
- Writing a set of procedures for a new or existing location
- Abstracting leases and building a critical-date schedule, with lease questions referred to counsel
- Organizing records ahead of an ownership change, a sale, or a handover between managers
Typical deliverables
- The specific outputs named in the proposal, such as a prepared application package, a procedure set, or a records index
- A short handover note covering what was done, what is open, and who owns it next
What you are responsible for
- Supplying information and approvals when the project plan needs them
- Reviewing, signing, and submitting as the applicant or license holder
- Engaging counsel where the work needs legal review or representation
Pricing
What changes the quote.
Ongoing management is a fixed monthly fee and one-time work is quoted as a project. The amount depends on the work involved, and these are the factors that move it.
- Number of locations. Each site adds its own calendar entries, records, and facility obligations.
- Jurisdictions. Each state, province, county, or city can add its own licenses, reporting, and local rules to track.
- License types. Retail, distribution, and other license categories carry different obligations and renewal cycles.
- The state of existing records. Organized, current records take less work to confirm than records spread across people, inboxes, and filing cabinets.
- Services combined. Compliance, operations, real estate, and licensing work can be engaged separately or together.
- Site visits and travel. How often someone needs to be on site, and how far away the sites are.
- Reporting cadence. How often you want written reports and review meetings, and how detailed they need to be.
Example scopes
Two hypothetical scopes, side by side.
These examples show how scope grows with locations and services. They are not client stories and carry no prices.
| Element | Example |
|---|---|
| Profile | One retail location, one state license, one local business permit, one lease. Compliance Management only. |
| Discovery deliverables | Records inventory; owner and store manager interviews; one site visit; findings summary; draft compliance calendar; recommended plan. |
| Ongoing deliverables | Maintained compliance calendar; monthly one-page owner report; procedure updates as needed; corrective-action tracking; regulatory change monitoring for the state and city. |
| Cadence | Calendar reviewed weekly; report monthly; site and standards review quarterly; plan reviewed once a year. |
| Fee | Set out in the written proposal. |
Hypothetical. These scopes illustrate the shape of a proposal. Your actual scope, cadence, and fee are set out in your written proposal.
| Element | Example |
|---|---|
| Profile | Three retail locations in two cities, three leases. Compliance Management, Business Operations Management, and Real Estate & Facilities Management combined. |
| Discovery deliverables | Records inventory per site; interviews with owners, site managers, and the bookkeeper; a visit to each site; lease abstracts with critical dates; comparison of procedures across sites; findings summary; draft calendar; recommended plan. |
| Ongoing deliverables | One calendar covering all three sites; monthly owner report with a status line per site; one procedure set with local variations recorded; lease critical dates tracked and raised with you and your counsel before notice windows open; vendor file upkeep; corrective-action tracking. |
| Cadence | Calendar reviewed weekly; monthly report and check-in call; site reviews on a rotation agreed in the proposal; plan reviewed once a year or when a site is added. |
| Fee | Set out in the written proposal. |
Hypothetical. These scopes illustrate the shape of a proposal. Your actual scope, cadence, and fee are set out in your written proposal.
To see what the deliverables look like, visit Sample Deliverables.
In writing
What is always in writing.
Before any paid work begins, the written proposal and the signed engagement agreement set out:
- The services in scope, and the locations and jurisdictions they cover
- The deliverables, and the reporting format and cadence
- The fee, and whether it is a fixed monthly fee or a project quote
- What is outside scope, including legal, tax, and brokerage work
- What you are responsible for, and who the point of contact is on each side
- How confidential information is handled, under the terms of the signed engagement agreement
- How changes to scope are requested and agreed
- The term, how either side ends the engagement, and what is handed back when it ends
What we do not promise
We manage the work. Others make the decisions.
SPL prepares, tracks, maintains, and reports. Regulators, licensing agencies, inspectors, landlords, and lenders make their own decisions, and we do not promise any licensing, inspection, lending, or regulatory result.
SPL Management is not a law firm, accounting firm, or real estate brokerage. We do not give legal, tax, or real estate advice, negotiate leases, or represent you before regulators. When a matter needs one of those, we bring in your counsel or other professionals and support them with organized records.
Talk through what your scope would look like.
A 30-minute fit call is enough to tell whether SPL suits your business and what a proposal would cover.