E-signature Updates: Improved Efficiency With Signer Priority & Template Library

In late 2021, signature templates were released to provide each firm with tools to mark-up boilerplate documents. 8879, 8821, and 2848 are a few examples, but this works with any type of document – add it one time and then reuse it in all future client interactions. The end goal is to reduce manual manipulations and allow you and your team to focus on high-value work and grow your firm.  

Although the templates reduced manual work by over 33 hours (assuming 1000 documents are sent for signature), there was still room for improvement. After a template was applied, you still had to indicate which fields were for which signer.

New Setting: Signer Priority 

We are delighted to announce that today’s release alleviates this issue. You can now set signing priority in client accounts – this controls the order in which each signer’s signature field will populate (example: the primary taxpayer signature will be placed before their spouse). Once the signature template is applied, the signature fields populate throughout the document in the desired order, automatically retrieving the signers’ initials and email addresses from account data. 

By default, the signing order is the same as the order in which the linked contacts appear in each account. To modify the order of signers, click on ‘Signing Priority’ – you can drag and drop to rearrange things to your liking.

When applying a template during a signature request or when editing the template, the signature order will match the order you have pre-set. Additionally, the UI has been improved to put firm member signatures at the end of the ‘Choose signer’ list.

Template Library for Common Forms

To help you get started, we added templates for commonly used forms (Forms 8879, 8821, and 2848) which are accessible via the Copy from Library button. As a reminder, TaxDome has templates for tasks, emails, organizers, contracts, messages, invoices, pipelines, and jobs. If there are commonly used forms you would like added, please let us know.

Learn more about creating signature templates on TaxDome in our Help Center.

What’s Next?

We plan on improving the signature flow for your clients by adding the ability to draw their signature, save it, and re-use it in future. 

If you have any suggestions on how to improve the e-signature flow, just let us know in the Feature Request Board!