Free working document
The on call readiness checklist for doulas
Everything that should be true about a birth client before her window opens, in the order it needs to happen.
Most of what goes wrong in a doula practice goes wrong quietly and early. The backup was never written into the contract. The balance was never chased because the client was lovely and it felt awkward. The birth location changed at 37 weeks and nobody told the second doula. None of these are dramatic on the day they happen, and all of them are expensive at 3 a.m.
This checklist runs a client from signature to close out in four stages. It is written for an independent doula working alone or in a pair, and every item is something you can do in an ordinary week rather than a systems overhaul. Work through it once for your next client and you will find at least two gaps in how you currently run a window.
At signing, before the date goes on your calendar
Two weeks before the window opens
While the window is open
After the birth or the final shift
How to use it
Run this once against a client you already have signed rather than waiting for a new one. Working doulas almost always find the same two gaps: the backup arrangement exists in conversation but not in the contract, and the balance date is a vague intention rather than a date attached to the due date window. Both take an afternoon to fix and both prevent the failures that cost real money.
After that, the checklist works best as a stage gate. Nothing moves to the next stage until the current one is complete: no window on the calendar without a signature, no window opening without a handoff sheet in your backup's hands, no new signing while a week already carries two open windows. Doulas who work this way stop having emergencies that were actually just admin left undone.
Send me the editable copy
Send yourself the editable copy and you can strike out the items that do not apply to your practice and add the ones specific to your birth locations.
Questions about this document
Is this useful for a postpartum only practice?
Most of it is, with the birth window stages read as contract periods instead. Scope in numbers, a named backup for shifts you cannot cover, balance dates, and close out invoicing all apply directly. The 36 week handoff stage is the part you would adapt.
What if I do not have a backup doula yet?
Then that is the first item to fix, and the checklist is a reasonable agenda for the conversation. Take it to a colleague you trust, agree the fee split and the handoff information, and write it down before either of you is in the middle of a labor.
How long does it take to work through?
The signing and 36 week stages take about twenty minutes per client once your templates exist. The first time is longer because you will be writing the contract clauses and the handoff sheet format you were missing, which is the point of doing it now rather than during a window.
From the checklist to the window itself
Every item on this list wants somewhere to live: the named backup and the fee split, the balance date at 36 weeks, the handoff sheet, the recovery days you block after a birth. In DoulaDay they attach to the due date window, so your next client inherits the routine instead of your memory. A demo takes about twenty minutes and we can set up your first two windows on the call.