Unlocking the Power of eSignature Legitimateness for Independent Contractor Agreements

How to eSign a document: eSignature legitimateness for Independent Contractor Agreement

hi everyone I'm attorney Aiden Kramer with the law office of Aiden Kramer in Colorado and you're watching all up in your business in this episode of all up in your business I'm going to talk about independent contractor agreements an independent contractor is anybody who performs a service for your business who's not an employee so when I work with businesses as the attorney I am a contractor if I hire a bookkeeper to work for me but not as an employee than they're my contractor so regardless of the service that's going to be performed by the contractor it's always a great idea to have something in writing that describes your relationship with the contractor and so I'm gonna walk through some of the important terms that you want to make sure are clarified in your agreement with your contractor first off obviously the agreement needs to describe what the contractor is going to be doing what service is the contractor performing next again pretty obvious payment how much is the contract are going to make what are you paying them when are you going to be paying them you also want to clarify in the agreement who's paying for expenses let's say you're hiring a designer to design your website who's going to be paying for licensing expenses for photos or hosting fees next you want to make sure the agreement specifies who owns what and this is huge in an independent contractor relationship just by default when you work with an independent contractor the contractor owns whatever it is the contractor creates so that web designer technically owns your website that they've created for you unless the contract says otherwise unless the contract says that it's a work-for-hire or there's some other language in the contract saying that you are going to own what the contractor creates because without that language in there the contractor is going to have ownership of it and that might not be what you want non-disclosure or confidentiality clauses are often an important provision and an independent contractor agreement if the contractor is going to be exposed to confidential information about your business like client lists financial information if that's stuff that you don't want out there in the public than having a confidentiality or non-disclosure agreement in your contractor agreement is going to be important because it says that the contractor can't disclose that confidential information and then of course the term and termination of the contract how long is this contract going to be effective as the contractor going to work for you for a year and then the contract terminates or is it indefinite and under what circumstances can either of you terminate the agreement if the contractor messes up and you don't like the work you might want to be able to terminate the agreement or if you don't pay your contractor is gonna want to terminate it in that case - it's also a good idea to have an indemnification provision in your contract indemnification provisions will protect either of the parties if the other party does something wrong I made a video a few weeks ago about indemnification provisions specifically because they are kind of complicated so instead of getting in more depth about that I'm gonna say just check back for that video if you have more questions about what indemnification means you also want your agreement to make it clear that this contractor is an independent contractor not an employee you're not partners this isn't a joint venture they're an independent contractor they're not going to have taxes withheld they're not gonna get paid sick leave or vacation pay they're not gonna get health benefits independent contractors don't get those things and you want all of that in writing so it's clear that your contractor is an independent contractor so those are just some of the important terms that you want to have in your contractor agreement of course the exact terms might vary depending on what the contractor is doing and your specific situation so when you're thinking about hiring an independent contractor it's always a good idea to seek the advice of a with drafting that agreement because you want it drafted specifically for your needs if you're in Colorado and would like any assistance with an independent contractor agreement please feel free to contact me my phone number and email are below be sure to subscribe to my channel and give me a thumbs up if you like all up in your business and want more thank you all so much for watching I'm Aiden Kramer and I'll see you next time