Sending an engagement letter

Two places to send from:

• /practice/engagement-letters — the broad queue page, send to any client
• /practice/clients/[id] → Engagement letters tab — scoped to one client; faster when you're already looking at their record

The send flow

1. Pick a client (skip if you're on the per-client page)
2. Pick a template — your saved templates appear in the dropdown. The default template's body auto-fills.
3. Edit the body if you need to customise this particular letter
4. Click Send for sign-off

The client receives a branded email. They click the link, review the letter in-app, click Approve (timestamp + IP captured for the TPB / TASA 5-year audit retention requirement), and the signed PDF gets stored on the engagement letter record.

If they reject, the letter goes to status rejected with the reason. You amend and re-send.

Saving templates

Settings → Engagement letter templates lets you save 2-3 reusable bodies (e.g. "Standard engagement", "BAS-only", "Wealth advisory"). Mark one as default; it auto-applies to every new send unless overridden.

Resolution priority for the letter body

If multiple sources are present, Frank uses them in this order:

1. Per-send override — whatever's in the textarea when you click Send
2. Named template — if you picked one from the dropdown
3. Practice default template — if you've marked one as is_default
4. Built-in fallback — Frank's generic TPB declaration

So you can save a default and have it apply automatically without ever picking it explicitly.

Where signed PDFs live

Each signed letter is rendered as a PDF and stored in Supabase Storage with a 5-year retention runbook. The PDF is fetchable via a 5-minute signed URL through /api/engagement-letters/{id}/signed-pdf (auth required: signer or practice member).

The engagement letter record + the immutable client_signoff_events log together constitute the legally defensible audit trail.