DocuSign Momentum 2021: Your Agreement Transformation Starts Here

DocuSign Momentum 2021: Your Agreement Transformation Starts Here

At our annual conference Momentum 2021, we heard from industry visionaries on the frontlines of digital transformation, listened to DocuSign customers discuss how they have transformed their agreement processes and learned about DocuSign’s latest product features. Through customer interviews, demos, panels and breakout sessions, customers joined us for a review of the innovation we saw over the last year, the current agreement technology landscape and beyond. 

Here, we answer all of the most frequently asked questions at this year’s Momentum, as well as give a quick recap of what you may have missed. You can also watch the full conference, on-demand.

Let’s jump straight into your questions, answered by our experts. 

Electronic signature

Q: Do recipients need to have a DocuSign account?

No, you don’t need to have a license to be able to sign an agreement. 

Q: How do you change the format of the date? 

You just need to navigate to the 'Settings' tab within your DocuSign account, and under the 'Signing and Sending' section 'Signing Settings' has the option to change the Date Signed format.

Q: Is it possible to have two signatories sign via DocuSign and the third signatory sign by hand in person without DocuSign marking the contract as complete after the first two signatures?

There are options to "Print and Sign" from DocuSign making it possible for recipients to sign by hand and still be part of the DocuSign workflow of that envelope.

Q: Is there a way to automatically place initial/signature indications on larger documents, instead of placing it page per page? 

Yes, just simply use the DocuSign Autoplace feature.

Q: Is there a way to add an official seal to a document within DocuSign after external clients have signed a contract?

This can be done using our electronic seal which can be added at your chosen step in the workflow. It is also possible to request recipients to sign with a stamp instead of an eSignature.

Q: What are the options apart for identifying signers?

There are many, including: SMS Authentication, Access Code (OTP), ID verification (Using government ID) and Phone Authorisation.

Q: As an eSignature customer, is SMS delivery already available to us?

SMS Delivery is a paid Add-On, you would need to contact your Account Manager for more information.

Q: When sending an agreement for signature via SMS can we put the delivery name as our company name?

Your company name will appear in the SMS Text. Find out more information on our SMS guide.

Q: Is eWitness an add-on feature to eSignature?

eWitness is available in our Enterprise Pro package at no additional cost.

Q: Is there a way to automatically alert the sender if a witness has signed from a different geo-location or after a certain time period has elapsed from the main signatory's signature application? 

The Geo information and timestamp information are available in the Certificate of Completion, however, there is no automatic notification for different Geos or timestamps.

Q: Can we adjust when a document is due to "expire"?

Yes, you can set up the expiration time frame. 

Q: Is it possible to add a list of recipients to DocuSign to avoid filling in name and email addresses each time?

Yes this is possible via Bulk Send. Please contact sales or your account manager to find out more.

Q: Is it possible to ask a recipient for their approval via DocuSign before the document is automatically sent to the recipient(s) to sign the document(s)? 

Yes this is possible. To find out more please contact sales or your account manager. 

Q: Is there a way of splitting up items? E.g. invoice, HR contracts, minutes, customer agreements…

Yes, you can set up folders for completed documents within the Manage tab.

Q: If the content changes each time on the document you want signed does that mean you can't use a template?

Template matching within DocuSign will allow you to upload a document with different content to the template. Reach out to our sales team to discuss this in more detail.

Q: When downloading a completed envelope with multiple PDFs, there is only a choice to combine all, or select one PDF at a time. Is there a way to select which documents I would like to combine and download? 

Yes, please contact sales  or your account manager.

Legality and Data Privacy 

Q: Is eSignature legally binding and accepted around the world?

Almost every country in the world has adopted an electronic signature law, and the vast majority recognise DocuSign’s form of eSignature as meeting the definition of a valid eSignature. DocuSign eSignature enables multiple parties in different jurisdictions to complete agreements in a legally valid way. DocuSign eSignature complies with UK law, eIDAS.

DocuSign has created a comprehensive guide to the law in each region here, or dive further into legality or in our eBook, A Legality Guide to eSignature.

Q: How acceptable is electronic sealing with government and public bodies?

Electronic seals are applied on behalf of legal persons, such as organisations or institutions. For example, an organisation can use electronic seals to certify the origin of paychecks or contracts. DocuSign offers EU Advanced eSeal with either Advanced or Qualified level Certificates compliant with the eIDAS regulation. Our eSeal solution is used by Councils in the UK as well as Law firms for use cases such as deeds.

Q: How should confidential documents best be stored? 

DocuSign follows robust storage and data privacy rules so it is secure to store on the platform itself. Please see our privacy policy for further details.

Q: Does the UK eIDAS recognise SES?

Yes, UK eIDAS recognises SES. This is typically what 99% of documents will require - QES and AES are more secure, but typically for fewer and more specific instances.

Q:  Does the QES identification process take place per signature request or one time with a certain validity in terms of  time?

The identification and registration process will take place once. After which, it will be valid for 2 years so you only need your credentials to sign moving forward. If the signer is already registered (perhaps they received a DocuSign document from another Company a year ago), then they can use their credentials and do not need to register/identify themselves.

Q: Is UK regulation compatible with EU legal requirements? Are there any legality complications when using DocuSign  between UK and EU countries?

Very little has changed since Brexit. Learn more about the legality of eSignature in a post-Brexit world in our blog: The impact of Brexit on electronic signatures.

Q: Can purged documents be accessed by DocuSign?

Once the purge happens, the envelope will still be viewable in the console, but not in the document itself. Instead, a message will be displayed in place of the document stating when the document was purged. 

Envelopes and the documents they contain that are purged or deleted from the DocuSign Agreement Cloud are permanently removed from the DocuSign Agreement Cloud. There are no tape or disk backups so "gone" is gone.

We keep the transaction data/Certificate of Completion. The audit log of a document is kept permanently even if the underlying document is delivered and purged by the owning account. This maintains DocuSign's ability to prove a transaction indefinitely.

Q: Where are the Document Envelopes stored? In the EU?

We are happy to provide customers with clarity regarding the storage location of their documents. There are currently two regional instances of the eSignature service for eDocument storage: the United States and the European Union. For customers based in the European Union and the UK, DocuSign has three data centres located in Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Paris. Customers may select their preferred storage region at the time their eSignature account is provisioned. 

Any authorised user can access an electronic document from anywhere in the world. The region in which an electronic document resides and the ability to access it are not connected. 

You can read more on our privacy policy.

Q: Has progress been made with HM Land Registry in terms of accepting electronic signatures for property deeds and transfers?

The HM Land Registry now accepts electronic signatures for property deeds. For a full breakdown please check out this blog: Electronic witness with authentication for HM Land Registry. 

Q: How many languages is IDnow available and in which jurisdictions is it recommended to use?

IDnow is available worldwide, supporting ID documents (passports, ID cards, residency permits, and driver’s licenses) in accordance with the common ICAO standard. At the moment, we cover documents in over 195 countries. Languages – English, German, French, Spanish and Portuguese. If you require additional languages, contact us so that we can support you with your requests.

Q: Which qualified certificate authority is used to issue qualified certificates?

DocuSign France is the entity of DocuSign that functions as a Certificate Authority approved under EU Trust list and can deliver both Advances as well as Qualified level certificates. In some cases local Certificate Authorities are required in which case DocuSign has an expansive network of Trust Service Providers to deliver local qualified certificates.

Busting Adoption Roadblocks

Q: How can companies evaluate further use cases in order to introduce them?

Visit our Knowledge Market and look at the Use Case Map Tool to analyse your use cases. We recommend that you go ahead with high ROI, fast implementation use cases first.

Q: Can you share best practices on how to implement the system in terms of change management? 

DocuSign Knowledge Market is a great place to start; Executive sponsorship is of key importance. After that, make sure that you are working on your internal and external communication strategy and train your users. You can also make use of our DocuSign University offerings (all users can access using their DocuSign login credentials).

Q: Hi, You mention that we as customers do not have to leave our CRM and you mention Salesforce. Is Dynamics also "talking" to DocuSign? 

DocuSign has over 350 pre-built connectors with leading applications which include CRM and  Salesforce. These pre-built connectors enable DocuSign and Salesforce to connect so that a process can be started in Salesforce which connects to DocuSign via our connector to execute an agreement. Learn more about our integrations with our dedicated web page. 

Q: Do you have a project plan for deployment? 

You can find a use case deployment toolkit which walks through the steps required to start planning each use case.

Q: Any tips for change-resistant people with limited technological comfort levels? How can DocuSign help us convince them this is safe? 

We have seen that strong executive sponsorship gives comfort to such employees. Clear messaging from your organisation's management level would certainly help—we have also seen that backing from the Legal Department is also a huge plus. Other than that, making sure that your end-users understand how intuitive and easy it is to use DocuSign would definitely take care of the issue. Organise training sessions, link DocuSign University courses on your Intranet, etc.

General 

Q: Is it possible to integrate DocuSign with other systems (e.g. Microsoft Dynamics)?

Yes, we have an existing Connector with MS Dynamics. If there is another system we do not have a connector with you can also avail of our Open API to achieve a custom integration—discover more about our APIs.

Q: Does DocuSign have an API for developers?

Learn more in our API Developers Centre. 

Q: How does DocuSign integrate with SharePoint?

We have an out of the box connector for Microsoft SharePoint, allowing you to send from SharePoint and have completed documents automatically return. This can also be extended using Power Automate. 

Q: As your system’s in the cloud, is it available to work on servers, so our documents wouldn't leave it?

Yes, this is available using the DocuSign Signature Appliance. Get more details about it here.  

Q: Can a user share completed documents stored in Docusign with another user after completion?

Yes. Envelopes can be shared with other account users, whether this is still in transaction or completed. Some customers decide to share the completed envelope by adding the person you would like to share with as a CC recipient at the end of the signing workflow. Find out more about how to share envelopes in our guide. 

Q: What does DocuSign Analyzer do with the agreements it reviews, i.e. are those stored? How do you ensure that the information found in an agreement is not used for other purposes?

DocuSign follows robust data privacy and legality rules. For further information please check out our Trust Centre.

Q: Are you partnering with another company for verification solutions or is ID Verification a  DocuSign developed solution? If you are partnering: is the partner providing authentication for all country IDs?

DocuSign has developed its own ID Verification solution but under the hood, we use different technology providers to ensure the broadest coverage. Read this article to learn more about country coverage and types of IDs.

Q: How many languages does the ID Verification feature support?

ID Verification supports all our 44 signing languages and 14 sending languages. Discover more about what languages are covered in our user guide.  

Q: Does DocuSign support qualified electronic signature (QES) with qualified eIDs from for example Sweden (Swedish bankID). Or is the highest level of security advanced electronic signature (AES) by using ID verification?

Through ID Verification, we only support up to AES level. We currently don't support Swedish bank ID for QES. However, DocuSign offers different options for QES outside of ID Verification. For example, DocuSign eSignature and itsme® Sign recently joined forces to offer QES in a simple and secure manner for Belgium and Luxembourg. Additionally, a remote QES option using IDnow with pretty broad coverage. There's also a connector to ZealID in Sweden. 

Learn more about all our QES providers in our guide.

Catch-up on Momentum on-demand. 

Conference Recap

Momentum 2021 saw us delve into specific products like eSignature, eWitness, CLM and Insight. Product experts brought us through demos and interviews with customers at Arm, Maersk and Womble Bond Dickinson allowed us to hear how DocuSign is being leveraged in different ways, in a variety of organisations.

Watch James French, Delivery Director at Arm—the company whose chip designs are in 90% of mobile devices, started using DocuSign eSignature and later added DocuSign Insight (AI-based analytics of a contract repository), DocuSign CLM, and DocuSign Click (clickwrap agreements).

See the full interview with Jacob Gorm-Larsen, Director of Digital Procurement at Maersk  to better understand how the world's largest integrated shipping company is driving value from electronic signatures, AI and contract analytics. 

You can watch the full interview between with Suzanne Gado, Practice Development Lawyer at Womble Bond Dickinson to learn more about how WBD is driving digital transformation in the legal sector. 

Sustainability - Trees for Cities, Unilever and DocuSign

We closed the Momentum 2021 keynote with our commitment to help protect the world’s forests.

Last year, Unilever, Trees for Cities and DocuSign came together to spend a day planting trees. See how we got on in the video below or read more to discover what each organisation is doing to protect the environment. By supporting Trees for Cities' tree planting projects in the urban environment, we are attempting to take our commitment to help protect and preserve the world’s forests one step further by playing a part in the effort to create greener and more resilient towns and cities.

Trees for Cities is the only UK charity working at a national and international scale to improve lives by planting trees in cities. We are partnering with the aim to enhance tree cover and restore urban green spaces in the UK and Ireland. This is part of our ambitious DocuSign for Forests initiative—playing our part in reducing their environmental impact and making commitments to save the planet. 

See how we got on in the video below: