The fourth round of changes rarely surprises the client. It surprises you, because nobody wrote down how many were included. Two sentences in the proposal prevent most of it, and RecReview keeps the evidence for the rest.
Decide three things before the first frame
How many rounds are included. Two is the common answer, and it matters less than saying what happens after that: hourly, a new estimate, or a new task.
What counts as approval. An answer in the portal, stamped with who approved it and when, rather than “looks great” on a call.
Which date is the promise. The date you gave the client is the Due date. Your own working date is the Internal deadline, it never reaches the client, and it has to fall on or before the promise.
Let the app record the rest
Once those three are settled, the process keeps its own minutes.
Send to client starts a round. It moves the task to client review, marks the version as awaiting review and emails the recipients, so a round has a beginning nobody has to remember.
The client blocker records that the ball is with them. While it is on, your internal deadline clock pauses, so the days the client spends deciding don’t eat your buffer. The date they were promised never moves on its own.
The approval ends the round, in the history, with a name and a timestamp.
The conversation you will eventually have
When round four arrives you don’t need a good memory. The delivery email already carries the numbers, written from the real history of the task rather than from anything you typed: what changed since the previous version, the hours tracked, the comments resolved out of the total, and how many versions the cut has been through.
“This is version six, 14 hours in, and the last three rounds came after the approval date” gives the client something specific to respond to, which “it feels like a lot of changes” does not.
Tip: Send your client the For your clients guide with the first delivery. Some of what looks like an extra round is a client who didn’t know they could reply in the thread.
What’s next
Set client and internal deadlines and Mark who a task is waiting on.