Glossary

The vocabulary of the secure contract, in plain terms.

The words of contractual security, defined simply. Each term stands on its own: enough to understand, and enough to be quoted accurately.

Secure Contract: A secure contract is a service contract whose execution is administered and tracked end to end, from the first quote to the last signature, following a structured process. It is the contractual equivalent of secure payment: the relationship follows a recognised method rather than resting on someone’s word. It rests on four functions: formalise, trace, keep, demonstrate.Secure Contract →
Contractual security infrastructure: The contractual security infrastructure is the set of means that make a service contract reliable throughout its life: it formalises commitments, traces steps, keeps documents and makes it possible to demonstrate what happened. It is to the contract what payment infrastructure is to the transaction.
The administered contract: An administered contract is no longer just a document, like a quote or an invoice: it is a process held step by step, from signature to perfect completion. Where the market stops at the document, administering the contract follows the relationship to the end.
Formalise: To formalise is to express commitments clearly, at the right moment. An accepted quote already counts as a contract; an unforeseen change is fixed with an amendment when it arises, not reconstructed after the fact.
Trace: To trace is to organise the events that matter in their chronology: the visit, the agreement, the start, the fix, the handover. The thread of the contract stays readable, not scattered across several tools.
Keep: To keep is to gather a contract’s useful documents and keep them accessible for its whole life, in one place, without having to search for them.
Demonstrate: To demonstrate is to be able to explain what happened with a clear, dated and coherent file, the day it is needed. You don’t look for proof there, you open a file.
Proof of execution: Proof of execution is what attests that a service was actually carried out: an accepted quote, a signed amendment, dated steps, a handover report. Under French law, whoever claims payment for a service must be able to prove it. That proof is built during the job, not at the moment of dispute.
The file: The file is a contract’s organised history: the commitments, the dated steps and the documents gathered. Recorded as it goes, it depends neither on your version nor the client’s: it shows the sequence just as it happened.
Impartial third party: An impartial third party is a role, not a status: the one who holds a contract’s file without taking sides, so that what it contains depends on neither party. It is this impartiality that gives a file its weight, without guaranteeing anything in a judge’s place.