Creator Agency Contract Checklist: Clauses to Cover

Most of these agreements are short. That is not the problem: the missing parts are always the same parts, and they go missing in the same direction: whatever was left unsaid gets read in favour of whoever drafted the document.

This page is the checklist itself. Rows you cannot point to are your exposure.

What is a contract checklist for, and who uses it?

It exists to turn a document nobody enjoys reading into 24 questions you have to answer. It is descriptive: it tells you what gets argued about, not what to write.

• The agency lead runs it before sending an agreement out, and again before signature.
• The creator runs it as a reading grid on any contract put in front of her, including one from an agency she likes.
• Whoever reviews it (a lawyer, an accountant) gets decisions already made instead of a blank page, which is the difference between a short review and a long one.

Stated plainly: this is not a model contract, and nothing here is legal advice. No wording is offered, because wording that works in one country is void in another. Take advice where you operate, and bring this list to that conversation.

What does the complete checklist look like?

Twenty-four questions in six families, and a contract that answers all of them is finished.

#	Family	The question your contract must answer, in plain words	Your clause	Cost of silence
1	Term	How long does it run, and does it renew by itself?		An auto-renewal nobody diarised
2	Term	What ends it: what notice, in what form, from what date?		Notice given in a chat thread, disputed later
3	Term	Is there a trial period, and what changes when it ends?		A trial that silently became the contract
4	Term	What happens to work in progress when notice is served?		Custom orders paid for and never delivered
5	Exclusivity	Which platforms and which accounts does it cover?		A new account inside the deal by accident
6	Exclusivity	Does it reach brand deals, other agencies, off-platform sales?		The first sponsorship becomes an argument
7	Exclusivity	Does exclusivity have an end date of its own?		It outlives the contract
8	Exclusivity	Can she be represented elsewhere in another territory or language?		Growth blocked with no upside for either side
9	Commission base	What exact amount is the percentage applied to?		Commission charged on money nobody received
10	Commission base	Which income sources are in, named one by one?		“All revenue” settles nothing
11	Commission base	Which costs may be rebilled, and is there a cap?		Expenses that quietly outgrow the rate
12	Commission base	When is the statement closed, and when is the payout made?		A payout date that moves every month
13	Ownership	Who owns content the creator made herself?		Ownership decided by whoever holds the files
14	Ownership	Who owns content the agency paid to produce?		A shoot invoiced twice, owned by neither
15	Ownership	What licence does the agency hold, for what use, for how long?		Marketing use continuing years after exit
16	Ownership	What happens to the library and the master files at the end?		Nobody can say who holds the originals
17	Access	Which accounts and tools does the agency get, at what level?		Blanket access nobody agreed to
18	Access	Who holds credentials and second factors, and where?		A shared password in a group chat
19	Access	Is access logged, and can the creator read the log?		No way to answer “who sent that”
20	Access	What happens to access on the day notice is served?		A creator locked out of her own account
21	Exit	What is handed back, in what format, by when?		A handover that never quite completes
22	Exit	Does commission continue after termination (at what rate, for how long, on which fans)?		Two commissions on the same sale
23	Exit	What happens to fan data and conversation history?		Both sides keep everything, neither can say so
24	Exit	Who tells the audience, and what may each side say afterwards?		A public argument in front of the roster

How do you fill in each column?

Work right to left. The last column is why the row exists; the middle column is the decision; the “your clause” column is the evidence.

• Family groups the rows so you can hand one block to one person. Ownership and access usually belong to a different conversation from commission.
• The question is written to be answerable in a sentence. If the answer needs a paragraph and a “well, it depends”, the clause is not settled.
• Your clause takes a reference (section number, page), not a summary. A summary you wrote yourself is not evidence of anything. Blank means uncovered.
• Cost of silence is the failure mode that row actually produces. Read it before you decide a row does not apply to you.

Above the table, keep a header block: parties, date signed, version, who reviewed it and when, the governing law, where the signed copy lives. That last line is not filler: a contract nobody can find is a contract nobody has.

Rows 9 to 12 run deeper than a checklist row, because the base is where the money is. Read the commission clauses alongside what agency commission and a revenue split mean on a statement.

Which three mistakes ruin a contract checklist?

Negotiating the rate before the base. The percentage is the only term that behaves exactly as it looks, which is why it absorbs the whole negotiation. Rows 9 and 10 change what the same percentage is worth, every month, in the same direction. Settle them first and the rate becomes a short conversation.

Leaving exit for last. Rows 21 to 24 cost nothing at signature, so two people who currently like each other wave them through. They decide what leaving costs. Answer them first, while goodwill is cheap and neither side knows who will want out.

Treating access as an operational detail. Access is not housekeeping; it is the clause that decides who can lock whom out. It belongs in the contract, not in a handover note, and it is the first thing to check the day notice is served in either direction.

When do you revise it?

Not on the anniversary. On scope changes, and there are only a few that matter:

• A new platform or a new account. Rows 5 and 6 were written about a surface that has since changed. This is the most common quiet breach in OFM.
• A change in what the agency covers. More shifts, fewer shifts, production taken in house: each moves what the commission buys.
• A new income source that gets large. Brand deals and off-platform sales cause no trouble at all until the month one of them is the biggest line on the statement.
• A change of counterparty. New entity, new owner, new manager: re-run the list.
• Before signing anyone new. The list improves every time an old contract disappoints you, and only helps the next creator if you re-run it, the discipline that keeps the common agency mistakes from repeating.

Date every revision and keep the old version. A contract with no version history is one where both sides remember a different deal, and both of them are being honest.