If I remember correctly, there're some suggestions scattered through the texts on possible tweaks to the character generation process, but I can't find anything at the moment specifically talking about the free contacts house rules that are used on this board a lot of the time. Ultimately, of course, it's gamemaster's discretion.
If you like using contacts, then I'd strongly suggest picking a level and making it official--2 or 3 x CHA are fairly typical, or you could give 15 "free" points for contacts. The normal BP & Karmagen processes tend to make contacts a bit of an after-thought, in my opinion (Hrm, let's see...do I take an extra -5 quality just so I can actually know someone? Nah, why bother?); making sure everyone has points that they can only spend on contacts makes it far more likely that they actually will.
And, if there's still space in the game, I'd love to jump in. Looks like there's a potential gun-slinger & a street sam, so I'll work on a face of some sort.
