Mandate

A mandate is a signed instruction from you to the contractor: do this work, for this price, by this date, with these guarantees. The clause is one sentence, sent in the first email before any work begins.

You are authorised up to EUR ___ to complete this repair. If you expect the cost to exceed that amount, stop and provide a written cost indication and a timeframe for completion before proceeding.

The mechanism: the mandate fixes the budget before the contractor sees the problem. Without it, the price is announced at the moment of maximum stress for the homeowner. With it, the contractor accepts within budget, declines, or surfaces overruns in writing.

The distinction matters at three moments. Comparing bids without a mandate clause is a comparison of intentions, not commitments. When work runs over, the contractor is bound to flag in writing rather than bill after. When something fails in year two, the mandate establishes who is responsible.

Sibling frame: quote (the contractor’s offer) and estimate (a non-binding ballpark). Confusing any two of the three is the most common single source of homeowner overpayment. See the how-to-set-a-mandate guide for the calculation method.