Five statuses, one of them relabelled
A proposal moves through a short lifecycle, and the client portal shows almost the same vocabulary the agency uses, with one deliberate change.
| On the agency side | In the client portal | Colour | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sent | Pending | Amber | It has arrived and nobody has opened it yet. |
| Viewed | Viewed | Blue | Someone on your side has opened it. Honest in both directions, and the reason a follow-up call is rarely a surprise. |
| Accepted | Accepted | Emerald | Signed and agreed. The card switches to showing who signed it. |
| Declined | Declined | Red | Turned down. It stays in your list rather than vanishing, so there is a record of what was offered. |
| Draft | Draft | Grey | Not something a client normally encounters. Working versions belong on the agency side. |
Note how Pending and Viewed are grouped everywhere it matters. The summary counter that says how many proposals need attention counts both, and so does the Pending filter tab. That is the right grouping: from a decision point of view, a proposal you have opened but not answered is in exactly the same place as one you have not opened.
The filter row offers All, Pending, Accepted, and Declined, alongside a search box. Real-time updates mean a proposal sent while a client is on the screen appears without a refresh, which occasionally makes for a slightly uncanny live sales experience.
The four figures, and the surprising one
Four cards sit above the list. Three are what you would expect: Total Proposals, Pending Review, and Accepted.
The fourth is Total Value, and it is genuinely unusual to put in front of a client. It sums the value of every proposal in their list, formatted as currency. Where a proposal carries an explicit total that figure is used; where it does not, the package prices are added up.
Most agencies would instinctively hide that number, and that instinct is worth examining. For a client working with three agencies, a single figure showing everything currently on the table is exactly the number they need to decide anything, and it is a number they would otherwise assemble by hand in a spreadsheet. Showing it is a confidence move. It also means a proposal with no priced packages contributes nothing, which is a quiet argument for putting real prices on packages rather than a note saying “to be confirmed”.
Reading the card before you open it
Each proposal card is designed to answer the first two questions without a click. Packages appear as chips, each showing the package name and its price in the proposal’s own currency. If there are add-ons, a further chip states how many are available.
The visual separation matters. A package is the offer; an add-on is an option. Rendering them the same way is how clients end up totalling a proposal wrongly and being surprised at the invoice. Here the add-ons are explicitly marked as available, which frames them as choices rather than line items.
For agencies, this puts weight on package naming. “Growth Retainer” and “Launch Sprint” read well as chips. “Option A” and “Option B” force a click to learn anything, which is exactly the friction the card exists to remove. There is more on structuring the offer itself in how to scope and price a proposal.
What expanding a proposal adds
Cards expand in place, which keeps the client on the list while they dig into one item. Expanding reveals three things the chips only summarise.
- The full package breakdown, rather than a name and a number.
- Optional add-ons listed properly, so a client can see what each one is before deciding whether they want it.
- The project schedule, which is the section clients read most carefully and agencies write most casually.
That third one deserves emphasis. Price is rarely the thing that kills a proposal on its own; price paired with a vague timeline is. A schedule in the proposal is also what later becomes the dated work a client tracks in My Projects and on the Timeline, so it is worth writing as though someone will hold you to it.
The signing surface, and three ways to use it
Review & Sign opens the proposal on its own page in a new tab, away from the dashboard. That page is the real document: the full content, the pricing, the schedule, and the signature block. Once a proposal is settled the same action becomes View Proposal, so the record stays reachable after the decision.
The signature block offers three methods, and they are not interchangeable in practice even though they produce the same result.
| Method | How it works | When to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Draw | Sign on a canvas with a mouse, a trackpad, or a finger on a touchscreen. | On a phone or tablet, where a finger is genuinely the fastest instrument. There is a clear action if the first attempt looks like a seismograph. |
| Type | Type your name and it is rendered into a signature image in a cursive typeface, with a choice of fonts. | On a laptop with no touchscreen, where drawing with a trackpad produces something nobody would recognise. This is the option most desktop signers should use. |
| Upload | Upload a PNG or JPG of your real handwritten signature, up to 2MB. | When your organisation has a standard signature image, or you want the same mark on every document you sign. |
The Type option is the one worth pointing clients at. Drawing a signature with a trackpad is the single most common reason someone abandons a signing flow and says they will print it and scan it later — which is where proposals go to die. Typing a name into a cursive face takes four seconds and looks like a signature.
Switching between the three tabs replaces the signature rather than combining them, so there is no risk of accidentally submitting a half-drawn mark after choosing to type instead.
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What acceptance records
Once a proposal is accepted, the card changes character. The status badge turns emerald, and where a signatory has been captured the card shows who signed it.
That detail earns its place months later, when someone asks who approved the scope. In most agencies the answer to that question lives in an email thread that nobody can find. Here it is attached to the proposal, visible to the client as well as the agency, which removes a whole category of awkward conversation.
An accepted proposal is also the natural start of the delivery record. The agency-side flow from accepted proposal into scheduled work and invoicing is described in Proposals, and the resulting invoices appear for the client in Invoices.
Declining well
Declining is a real outcome, and the portal treats it as one rather than hiding it. A declined proposal keeps its place in the list under a red badge and can be filtered to directly, so the record of what was offered and refused stays intact on both sides.
What the status cannot carry is why. And the why is the whole value. A decline that means “too expensive” and a decline that means “wrong timing, ask again in Q3” look identical in a status field and are completely different pieces of commercial information.
So the useful habit, for clients: decline the proposal and then send a line in Messages saying which part did not work. And for agencies: a proposal that goes Viewed and then silent is not a decline, it is an unanswered question, and it is usually cheaper to ask than to resend.
How to review and accept a proposal
- Open Proposals in the portal and find the one marked Pending or Viewed.
- Read the package chips on the card to get the shape and the price before you open anything.
- Expand the card to see the full package breakdown, any optional add-ons, and the project schedule.
- Choose Review & Sign, which opens the full proposal in a new tab.
- Read it properly, including the schedule, then sign using Draw, Type, or Upload.
- Submit. The card in your portal switches to Accepted and records who signed.
Step two is the one most people skip and the one that saves time. Reading the chips first tells you whether this is a proposal you need thirty seconds for or thirty minutes, and that decision is much better made before you open a long document in a new tab.
Frequently asked questions
How does a client accept a proposal in Arpixa?
From the Proposals screen in the portal, a proposal that is pending or viewed carries a Review & Sign action. That opens the full proposal on its own page in a new tab, where the client reads it and signs using one of three methods: drawing, typing their name in a cursive typeface, or uploading an image of their signature. On submission the status becomes Accepted.
Why does the portal say Pending when the agency sent the proposal?
Because the label is written for the reader. A proposal stored as Sent on the agency side is shown to the client as Pending in amber, which describes the client’s situation rather than the agency’s action. Viewed, Accepted, and Declined keep their names because those already read correctly from both sides.
Can the agency see that I opened the proposal?
Yes, and so can you. Viewed is a real status shown in your own list, so the tracking is not hidden from the person being tracked. That symmetry is worth noting: an agency following up two days after you opened something is not guessing, and you can see exactly what they can see.
What are the four numbers at the top of the Proposals screen?
Total Proposals, Pending Review, Accepted, and Total Value. The last one is unusual in a client-facing screen: it sums the value of every proposal in your list. For a client working with several agencies it is a quick read on total commitment and total exposure in one figure.
How are optional add-ons shown?
The card shows a chip for each package with its name and price, and, when add-ons exist, a separate chip stating how many are available. Expanding the card lists them properly. Keeping them visually distinct from packages is the right call, because an add-on is a choice and a package is the offer.
What are the three signature methods, and does it matter which I use?
Draw on a canvas, type your name into a cursive typeface, or upload an image of your signature up to 2MB. All three produce the same kind of signature record, so the choice is purely practical: draw on touchscreens, type on laptops without one, upload if you have a standard image you use everywhere.
What happens if a proposal has no share link?
The action explains that the proposal link is not ready yet and to ask your agency to share it, rather than opening a broken page. It is an agency-side step; the proposal exists but has not been published to a shareable address.
Can I decline a proposal without a conversation?
Declining is available on the proposal itself, and the declined state is then reflected on the card in your portal. What it does not do is explain your reasoning, and that is the part worth handling separately. A short note in Messages saying which part did not work is what turns a dead proposal into a revised one.