Retainers can bring the best kind of stability to agency life: predictable income, clearer capacity planning, and longer client relationships. But they can also become one of the fastest ways to erode margin, especially when “a small favour” turns into a weekly pattern and nobody can confidently answer, how much have we actually used?
The good news is that most agency retainer problems aren’t caused by the retainer itself. They come from how it’s structured and tracked. With the right setup in Synergist, retained work becomes easier to manage, easier to report on, and much harder to overservice.
This article walks through the approach we see working best in agencies day-to-day.
Before you set anything up, it’s worth getting crisp on one thing: agencies often use “retainer” to mean any ongoing relationship.
What is an agency retainer?
An agency retainer is a fixed monthly, quarterly, or annual fee paid by a client to an agency to secure a set number of hours or services. The fee is typically paid upfront, often discounted, and can vary based on the scope of the work. The agency commits resources; the client commits spending.
There are two common types of retainer:
Hard (fixed): a fixed-term agreement (often annual) with a monthly fee and a defined level of service or hours, with additional work or services billed separately. If you don’t use up the agreed number of hours, you can apply a ‘use-it-or-lose-it’ approach, or roll hours over to the next month.
Soft (variable): a more flexible agreement where a client earmarks a budget and draws it down across separate projects as needed (sometimes called a 'budget pot'). The relationship is ongoing, but the work is more project-based, and the workload is lumpy.
In practice, there are two very different commercial arrangements hiding under the 'retainer' label. Why it matters: these models behave differently for forecasting, resourcing, and risk. If you treat a budget pot like a retainer, capacity plans will be misleading, and revenue will look more predictable than it really is.
Retainers: the agency challenge
On paper, retainers are a win-win. In reality, the usual friction points show up fast:
- Overservicing and scope creep: retained work expands because it can, especially when people don’t have an easy view of usage.
- Messy tracking: if time is coded inconsistently, reporting becomes a debate rather than a source of truth.
- Resourcing pressure: seasonal spikes and quieter periods make it harder to balance workloads across teams.
- Discount errors: preferential rates are common, but if they’re handled clumsily, you end up with rate-card confusion (or inaccurate profitability).
- Forecast risk: break clauses and notice periods mean not all “annual value” is equally safe.
To make a retainer work for everyone, you need clarity on both sides—and a system structure that makes that clarity visible every week, not just at renewal time.
How Synergist supports agency retainer management
Synergist gives you flexibility because you can structure retained work in a few different “models”. You’re not forced into a single retainer template. Instead, you can choose a model that fits your agreement.
Below are the most useful models, and when to use each:
1. The annual retainer pot (one job, one phase)
Best when the retainer is essentially one pool of time/value you manage across the year.
This is the cleanest starting point, and the one most agencies find simple and low admin.
You set up one job per year, with one main phase representing the retainer and 12 billing plan items for monthly invoicing and estimate the time required across the relevant roles.
Why it works so well:
- The team books time in one place all year (no monthly job hopping)
- Client services get a clear annual burndown
- Finance invoices reliably from the billing plan
- Reporting stays consistent month to month
This is ideal when the client conversation is about capacity and responsiveness, rather than a tightly controlled breakdown of service lines.
2. The service-line retainer (one job, multiple phases)
Best when you and the client care about how effort is split across services.
Some retainers aren’t just “a pot of hours.” They’re a bundle of services.
In Synergist, you can keep the same annual job structure but add separate phases for service lines, such as Strategy, Design, Social, and PR.
This model is useful because it gives you:
- It’s still a single job, so easy admin, timesheets and billing
- Visibility of where effort is actually going (and where it’s underused)
- Better evidence for future proposals and fee reviews
3. The service-line retainer (one annual job, multiple stages)
Best when you want a simple annual pot but still need category-level visibility into how the retainer is being used.
Some retainers are best managed as a single annual “pot” of hours (planned across the relevant roles), but you still want visibility into what the work is actually being spent on.
In Synergist, you can do this by setting up one job for the year with one main phase holding the annual estimate (planned across the relevant roles), then use stages to categorise the work. The team logs time to the same job/phase and selects the appropriate stage (category), so you get a clean annual burndown and a clear breakdown of retained activity by type.
This is a useful middle ground when you want better reporting and client conversations (“here’s where the retainer is going”) while keeping the retainer structure simple.
4. Use-it-or-lose-it retainers (a job or phase per month)
Best when hours don’t carry over, and you need clean monthly visibility into consumption.
If you’ve agreed on a fixed monthly allowance with a use-it-or-lose-it rule (no hours carried over), a monthly structure keeps things clear and prevents accidental overservicing.
In Synergist, you can run one job for the year and add a phase per month, with the agreed hours planned against the relevant charge codes. That makes it easy to track time spent vs estimated each month. The team logs time to the relevant month, and you can raise a monthly sales invoice in line with the agreement.
This structure is also helpful when the workload isn’t evenly spread. If a client reliably needs more support in (say) September and less in January, you can allocate more hours to the September phase and reduce another month. That gives you a more accurate view for capacity planning without changing the commercial agreement.
Managing seasonal / campaign peaks within a retainer
Many retainers include known spikes: a summer event, a Christmas campaign, a product launch. Monthly invoices might stay flat, but workload doesn’t.
Instead of breaking the retainer into monthly jobs (high admin), you can keep the annual structure and model reality by adding a phase (or stages) for peak activity, with realistic date ranges and estimated hours. That way, your capacity plan understands “July is heavy” without you having to build a separate job.
Retainer management features
Once the structure is right, these features help you protect margin, plan, and report.
Discounted retainer rate cards
When a client has both retainer work and project work, the key is to make sure discounted retainer pricing doesn’t accidentally spill into non-retained projects.
In Synergist, you can achieve this by using client-specific rate cards alongside retainer-specific versions of charge codes.
The outcome is simple: retainer jobs are reliably priced at the agreed discounted rates, while project work for the same client continues at standard rates, with clean reporting across both.
Handling rolling retainers, notice periods and break clauses
Not every retainer is guaranteed for 12 months. Many are rolling agreements or include notice periods and break clauses. If your systems treat all retainer revenue as equally secure, forecasting will look healthier than reality.
A simple way to avoid that is to capture the commercial reality on the client record using a few custom fields, such as contract start/end dates, a break clause (or review) date, and a risk level. Surfacing these fields in job and organisation lists (for example, a “retainer risk” view) gives teams a clear runway: which retainers are coming up for renewal, which might be at risk, and where action is needed on the account.
Forecasting with weighted billing
Weighted billing is one of the most useful forecasting tools in Synergist for retainers. Instead of treating every future invoice as equally “bankable”, you can assign a confidence percentage to each billing plan item.
Confirmed income can be set to 100%, while less certain future months can be discounted (for example, to 50%). You still see the full retainer value in the plan, but your forecast becomes more conservative and reliable — helping you avoid planning as if every month is guaranteed.
How Synergist reporting keeps retainers under control
Whichever retainer model you choose, these reports are what keep it commercially healthy - helping you spot drift early, manage peaks and troughs, and stay confident about what’s really happening.
1) Job burndown (the health check)
This is the simplest retainer signal: how much of your retainer pot has been used and what’s left. It’s a quick way to spot retainers that are on track to hit 100% early, before it turns into overservicing and uncomfortable conversations. If you’re also using resource bookings, you can factor in booked work so you’re not surprised by what’s already committed.
2) Time remaining (runway through the year)
For annual retainers, a “time remaining” view helps teams understand runway: how much time is left and, importantly, what that implies for the rest of the year. It’s particularly helpful if your agreement includes rollover, because it keeps expectations realistic as the year progresses.
3) Monthly burndown (are we pacing correctly?)
A monthly view shows whether you’re trending ahead or behind, and highlights the months where the retainer is being hammered. This is especially useful when you want to see patterns by service line, phase, or work category, so you can manage peaks and troughs more proactively.
4) “This month / last month” timesheet views (what actually happened)
Sometimes the account team just needs a quick, reliable snapshot: what hours were logged recently, and what did that translate to in cost and charge value? A simple month-on-month view makes it easy to keep client conversations grounded in reality without getting lost in heavy reporting.
5) Invoiced vs actual (commercial reality check)
A retainer can look fine on hours but still drift commercially - especially when preferential rates or write-offs are involved. Comparing what you invoiced with the value of time delivered (month or year-to-date) is a fast way to check whether you’re under- or over-recovering.
6) Capacity forecasting (can we actually deliver this?)
Retainers are where capacity gets squeezed, because lots of “small” commitments add up across clients. Reporting expected hours by month (by role, team or person) helps you see whether you have enough capacity and where pressure is building, especially when retainers include seasonal peaks.
7) Weighted billing forecast (confirmed vs at-risk revenue)
For forecasting, weighted billing is a standout feature. It lets you apply a confidence percentage to each billing plan item, so confirmed income can be 100%, while revenue further out can be discounted (for example, to 50%) if it’s less certain. That creates a more conservative forecast and reduces the risk of planning as if a full year of retainer income is guaranteed when a client could change plans on short notice.
Make your agency retainers predictable (and profitable)
Retainers don’t become unprofitable because they’re “bad work”. They become unprofitable when the structure is too loose, tracking is inconsistent, and nobody can see the warning signs early enough to act.
Synergist helps by letting you match the setup to the agreement in front of you and then adding the controls that keep it healthy. If you want to see what this looks like with your own retainer setups, book a Synergist demo, and we’ll walk you through the best structure for your agency, plus the reports that keep overservicing and forecasting surprises in check.