Custom Relationships, Contract Family Tree, and Metadata Roll-Up

Last updated: October 9, 2026

Three features in the Contract Repository work together to keep a master agreement and everything signed under it connected, visible, and up to date. Custom Relationships lets you link contracts with labels your team actually uses. The Contract Family Tree shows those links as one picture. Metadata Roll-Up carries key dates and values from the newest contract up to the agreement it changes.

At a glance

Feature	What it does	Who sets it up	Where you see it
Custom Relationships	Lets you create relationships with your own names (Amendment, SOW, DPA) and link contracts with them	Admins create relationships. Users link contracts.	Admins manage relationships under Manage > Contract relationships. Users pick one when linking contracts in the tree.
Contract Family Tree	Draws every linked contract as one tree, with the master agreement at the top	Nothing to set up. It builds itself from your links.	Tree icon next to the contract title, or View family on the contract summary page
Metadata Roll-Up	Copies chosen fields, like Expiry Date or Contract Value, from a child contract to its parent and every contract above it	Admins choose which fields roll up for each relationship	The parent contract's metadata, marked as rolled up

Each feature works on its own. Linking contracts is useful even if you never open the tree, and the tree is useful even if no fields roll up. Used together, they answer the question most teams struggle with: what are the terms in force for this customer today?

Key terms

Term	Meaning	Example
Relationship	The name your team gives a link between two contracts. Admins create relationships, and each one has a type.	Addendum, Order Form, SOW
Type	Every relationship is one of two types, Child or Related. The type decides where a contract sits in the tree.	Addendum is type Child. SOW is type Related.
Child	A contract that changes or adds to another contract. Each contract can have only one parent.	Amendment 1 to MSA with Acme
Related	A contract that sits alongside another without changing it. A contract can have many Related links.	SOW with Acme, or NDA with Acme
Parent	The contract a Child is linked to. SpotDraft assigns this role. You can't create a Parent relationship.	Master Service Agreement with Acme
Contract Family Tree	Every contract connected to each other through Child or Related links, shown as one tree	The MSA, its amendments, the SOW, and the NDA
Roll-up	Copying metadata field values from a child contract to its parent, and up to every contract above it	Expiry Date from Addendum 1 updates the MSA
Original value	The value written in the contract itself	MSA Expiry Date: Dec 31, 2025
Prevailing value	The value in force after roll-up	MSA Expiry Date: Dec 31, 2026, from Addendum 1

Custom Relationships

Custom Relationships lets you link contracts using the words your team already uses, such as Addendum, Order Form, or Statement of Work. You pick the name. You also give each relationship a type, Child or Related, which decides where the contract sits in the tree.

How it works

Every relationship has one of two types.

Child. For contracts that change or add to the terms of another contract, like an Addendum or Amendment. A contract can have only one parent, so a Child link always points to a single governing contract.
Related. For contracts that belong with another but don't change its terms, like an SOW or an NDA. A contract can have as many Related links as it needs.

You never create a Parent relationship. When you link an Amendment to an MSA with a Child relationship, the MSA becomes the parent on its own.

Every SpotDraft workspace starts with four relationships: Child, Addendum, and Amendment, all of type Child, and Related, of type Related.

Create a relationship (admins)

Go to Manage > Contract relationships.
Click Create new relationship. A side sheet opens with a form.
Fill in the form.
- Name. What users see when they link contracts, for example, "Order Form".
- Type. Child or Related. Choose Child when this contract changes the terms of another one, and its values should be able to update that contract through roll-up. Choose Related when it only belongs with another contract. A quick test: should this contract be able to change the other's Expiry Date or Contract Value? If yes, pick Child.
- Description. A short note shown to users so they pick the right relationship.
- Node details. Three slots that decide what shows on contracts linked with this relationship in the tree. Each slot is a dropdown. Pick basic contract details, user details, or a metadata field, for example, Contract ID, Business User, or Effective Date.
Save the relationship. It shows up for everyone the next time they link contracts.

The side sheet also has a Roll-up settings tab. See Metadata Roll-Up below.

Link two contracts

You link contracts from the Contract Family Tree.

Open the tree for the contract you want to link from. See 'Open the tree' below.
Hover over the contract and click Add relationship. A tab opens with a list of contracts you can link it to.
Find the contract you want to link. Hover over it and click Set relationship.
Choose the relationship between the two contracts.
Click Next. If the link will roll up any values, you'll see a preview of every metadata field that will change.
Confirm. SpotDraft creates the link and rolls up the values.

Contract Family Tree

The Contract Family Tree shows every contract linked to the one you're looking at, arranged as a hierarchy instead of a flat list. There's nothing to set up. SpotDraft builds the tree from the links you create with Custom Relationships.

How the tree is arranged

The parent sits at the top. Child contracts sit beneath it. Related contracts sit beside the contract they're linked to.

Master Service Agreement with Acme      (Parent)
  ├── Amendment 1 to MSA with Acme      (Child)
  ├── Amendment 2 to MSA with Acme      (Child)
  └── Addendum 1 to MSA with Acme       (Child)
Statement of Work with Acme             (Related to MSA)
NDA with Acme                           (Related to MSA)

The tree follows links as far as they go. If A is related to B and B is related to C, you'll see C when you open the tree from A.

Open the tree

Every contract has a tree, even one with no links yet. It's simply a tree of one, which is where you add its first relationship. Open the contract's summary page. You can open the tree from two places there:

The tree icon next to the contract title.
View family in the Document section on the side of the summary page.

Same tree from every contract

You always see the whole tree, starting from the top-most parent, no matter which contract you open it from. Open it from the NDA in the example above, and you still see all six contracts. The contract you opened it from is highlighted, so you can see where you are.

This matters because the parent's terms often govern everything around it. Someone viewing the SOW needs to see that Amendment 2 changed the MSA's Contract Value.

Click any contract in the tree to open it.

Metadata Roll-Up

Metadata Roll-Up copies selected fields from a child contract to its parent, so the parent shows the terms in force today. If an Addendum extends the MSA's Expiry Date, the MSA shows the new date, renewal reminders use it, and reports pick it up. Nobody has to edit the MSA by hand.

SpotDraft keeps the parent's original value, so you can always see what the contract itself says. The prevailing value is the one in use. To go back to the original, edit the field on the parent manually.

Roll-up works only in workspaces on SpotDraft's latest contract metadata architecture. Workspaces on legacy metadata need to migrate first.

What rolls up

Only the metadata fields your admin selected in the roll-up settings for that relationship. If the Addendum relationship is set to only roll up Expiry Date, a new Contract Value on an Addendum stays on the Addendum.

When a roll-up happens

A roll-up starts in any of these three cases:

Two linked contracts both become executed. If you link them while either is still a Draft or in Redlining, the roll-up waits until both are executed.
Someone links two contracts that are already executed, using a relationship with roll-up turned on.
Someone updates a roll-up field on an executed child contract whose parent is also executed.

What happens next depends on the mode your admin chose for that relationship.

Automated. The values roll up straight away. Nobody needs to step in.
Manual. A user confirms the roll-up before anything changes. SpotDraft shows each field's current value and new value side by side, for example: Expiry Date on MSA with Acme is Dec 31, 2025. Addendum 1 sets it to Dec 31, 2026.

Rules to know

Values keep climbing. A roll-up from a child goes to its parent. If that parent is itself the child of another contract, the values carry on up to that one too, and so on to the top. Every contract above the child gets the update. Values never move down the tree or sideways to a Related contract.
The latest child wins. Children of the same parent are numbered in order: 1, 2, 3, and so on. When more than one child rolls up the same field, the parent takes the value from the child with the highest number, the one lowest in the tree. Numbering runs across relationships, so Addendum 1, Amendment 2, and Addendum 3 share one sequence. If you add an older contract after a newer one, check the numbering so the newest contract has the highest number.
Your edits win. If someone edits the field on the parent by hand, that value stays, and future roll-ups to that field stop.
Computed fields can't receive a roll-up. A computed field on the child can still roll up to a regular field on the parent.

Set up roll-up (admins)

Roll-up is set per relationship, so Addendum and Amendment can behave differently even though both are type Child.

Go to Manage > Contract relationships and open a relationship, or create a new one.
Open the Roll-up settings tab.
Turn on Enable metadata roll-up. The rest of the settings appear.
Choose Automated or Manual.
Select the metadata fields that should roll up, for example, Expiry Date and Term Length. Leave out anything that shouldn't change on the parent.
Save.

Where you see rolled-up values

Place	What you see
Contract metadata	The prevailing value, marked as rolled up, with the original value and the source contract alongside
Activity Log	Every roll-up, for example, "Metadata roll-up edited contract metadata Expiry Date from Dec 31, 2025 to Dec 31, 2026"
Repository	The prevailing value, with a way to see the original. You can add prevailing fields as columns and filter on them.
Reports	Two columns for each rolled-up field: Original and Prevailing
Metadata sync to external systems	For any configured sync, such as Salesforce, HubSpot, or Jira, your admin chooses per field whether to send the original or the prevailing value

How the three work together

Each feature depends on the one before it. Custom Relationships creates the links. The Contract Family Tree reads those links to draw the picture. Metadata Roll-Up uses the same links to decide which values flow where. Set up the relationship types well, and the other two follow.

Example: Acme's contracts over two years

Acme signed an MSA in 2024 with an Expiry Date of Dec 31, 2025 and a Contract Value of $500K. In 2025, Acme signs Amendment 1, which extends the MSA to Dec 31, 2026, and raises the Contract Value to $750K. Your admin has set the Amendment relationship to roll up Expiry Date and Contract Value.

Link the contracts. A legal user links Amendment 1 to the MSA with the Amendment relationship, and links the SOW and NDA with the Related relationship. That's Custom Relationships.
Roll-up runs. All four contracts are executed, so SpotDraft copies Amendment 1's Expiry Date and Contract Value up to the MSA. The SOW and NDA are Related, so nothing rolls up from them.
The renewal reminder moves. The MSA's reminder now counts down to Dec 31, 2026, not the original 2025 date. No false alarm reaches your GC.
Finance gets the right number. A report on Acme shows $750K in the Prevailing column next to the original $500K.
Anyone can see why. A sales rep opens the SOW and clicks the tree icon next to its title. They see the whole tree with the SOW highlighted, and the MSA showing the values in force.

Master Service Agreement with Acme                 (Parent)
  Expiry Date     Dec 31, 2026  rolled up from Amendment 1
  Contract Value  $750K         rolled up from Amendment 1
  └── Amendment 1 to MSA with Acme                 (Child)
Statement of Work with Acme                        (Related to MSA)   << opened from here
NDA with Acme                                      (Related to MSA)

Without the links, there's no tree and no roll-up. Without roll-up, the tree still shows the contracts, but someone has to read each amendment to work out the current terms.

FAQ

1. Why can't I pick Parent when I link contracts?

Parent is a role SpotDraft assigns, not a relationship you can choose. Link the newer contract to the governing one with a Child relationship, and the governing contract becomes the parent.

2. One Amendment changes both our MSA and our DPA. How do I link it?

A contract can have only one parent. Link it with a Child relationship to the agreement whose values it should update, and with a Related relationship to the other. Related links never roll up metadata, so only the parent gets the Amendment's values. We set this limit on purpose. With more than one parent, links can loop back on themselves, and roll-ups would then go round in circles, each contract overwriting the next.

3. Does roll-up work on contracts in draft or Redlining?

No. Both contracts must be executed. A pending roll-up runs once they are.

4. Can someone check a roll-up before it changes the parent?

Yes. Ask your admin to set that relationship's roll-up mode to Manual. A user then sees the current and new values and confirms before anything changes.

5. Why didn't a value roll up from our SOW?

Roll-up only moves from a child to its parent. An SOW linked as Related keeps its values to itself.

6. I changed the parent's Expiry Date by hand. Will the next Addendum overwrite it?

No. A value someone types in always wins, and that field stops receiving roll-ups.

7. We're on legacy metadata. Can we use roll-up?

No. Roll-up needs SpotDraft's latest contract metadata architecture. Talk to your CSM about migrating.