Overview
The Auto-Send for Signature feature lets you configure a template so that any agreement drafted from it is sent for signature automatically, with no one needing to place signature boxes, configure signatories and click "Send."
Once an agreement created from an auto-send template reaches the Ready for Signature status, LinkSquares Sign sends it out to the configured recipients.
Because auto-send requires the system, not a person, to send the agreement, a few things need to be defined ahead of time at the template level:
- Which signature tokens map to which signatories
- Who the agreement is sent as (the "sender")
- Whether recipients sign all at once or in a set order
- Whether each recipient's details are entered at submission or pulled from a saved recipient
- Whether any signatory should only receive a copy instead of being required to sign
What this article covers: How to configure a template so agreements created from it are automatically sent with LinkSquares Sign for signature, and what the drafting experience looks like once auto-send is turned on.
- Auto-send requires signature tokens to be present in the underlying document.
- Each signature token set is filled by one auto-send recipient.
Getting Started
Turning Auto-Send On for your Account
Before auto-send can be configured on any template, it needs to be enabled account-wide by an admin. This is done under Finalize Settings > Signature Requests.
Near the bottom of the Finalize Signature Request Permissions section is a toggle labeled Allow auto-send for signature. Turning this on allows template editors to configure a template to route for signature automatically once an agreement reaches Ready for Signature. Turning it off disables auto-send on every template at once; any signature requests already in flight are not affected.
Once this is turned on at the account level, template editors can proceed to configure auto-send on individual templates as described below.
What Auto-Send looks like Configured
Before getting into the configuration steps, here is what a published template looks like once auto-send is fully set up. The template preview shows an Auto-Send On badge next to the Signatories section, along with the mapped signatories, their signing order, and the settings at the bottom of the page: Auto-send for Signature (On), Ordered signature (Off or On depending on setup), and Auto-send sender.
Auto-Send is Turned Off by Default
By default, a new template has auto-send turned off.
In this state, the Signatories section is used only to map the document's signature tokens.
For example:
#[SIGN::NAME_1]#
#[SIGN::TITLE_1]#
#[SIGN::SIGNATURE_1]#)
Tokens are created to a signatory and a role label, such as "LinkSquares - Legal" or "Counterparty - Finance."
With auto-send off, whoever manually sends the agreement chooses the actual recipients directly in LinkSquares Sign.
Turning Auto-Send On
Toggling Auto-send for signature ON tells LinkSquares that agreements created from this template should be sent to LinkSquares Sign automatically once the latest version reaches Ready for Signature, and that recipient emails should be collected on the submission form instead of being entered manually by a sender.
Turning this on replaces the simple token mapping table with a new Signature routing section.
With Ordered signature left off, every recipient listed under "All recipients" is emailed for signature at the same time.
Setting the Auto-Send Sender
Because no one clicks "Send" when auto-send is on, the template needs a named sender. This setting overrides any Global Signature Request Permissions or Template Specific Signature Request Permissions above it specifically for auto-sent agreements; agreements that are still sent manually continue to use those permissions instead.
There are three choices for the Auto-send sender:
- Default: Agreement author, the user who submitted the agreement request
- Agreement owner, the template's default agreement owner
- Specific user, a single named user who always sends agreements created from this template
Enabling Ordered Signature
By default, with Ordered Signature off, every recipient receives the signature request at the same time. Turning Ordered signature on changes the Signature routing section into a series of numbered steps, one recipient (or recipient group) per step.
Each step only receives the request once the step before it has been signed, and steps can be reordered using the up and down arrows.
Assigning a Saved Recipient to a Step
Each step's recipient details normally default to Entered at submission, meaning whoever drafts the agreement will be asked to supply that recipient's name and email.
For a recipient who is always the same person, such as an internal reviewer, you can instead set the recipient details dropdown to Set on Template and click Choose recipient.
Selecting Choose recipient opens a dialog where you can search for or manually enter the recipient's name, email, and optional job title.
Once saved, that step displays the chosen person's name and email directly, and the agreement drafting form will no longer ask for that recipient's information, since it is already known.
Making a Signatory Copy-Only
Not every signatory needs to sign. A signatory can be moved out of the numbered signing steps and into a "Receives a copy, not a signing step" section at the top of Signature routing.
That recipient's details are still collected (so the copy can be emailed to them), but they are not required to sign and do not block any step from proceeding.
A copy-only recipient can be converted back into a signer at any time using the Make a signer button
In this example, the LinkSquares - Legal signatory in Step 1 uses the saved recipient set in the previous step, Counterparty - Finance now only receives a copy, and Counterparty - Legal remains a required signer in Step 2.
Drafting an Agreement from an Auto-Send Template
When a user drafts a new agreement from a template that has auto-send turned on, the submission form includes a banner noting that the template auto-sends for signature and describing how many ordered steps recipients will be emailed in. The form then asks for the agreement name followed by the signature recipient details for each signatory who is not already set to a preconfigured recipient.
The agreement creation flow then resumes the remaining agreement questions included on the template.
Note: In this example, no field appears for the LinkSquares - Legal signatory, since that recipient was already configured as a preconfigured recipient on the template.
The form only prompts for the two remaining signatories, Counterparty - Finance and Counterparty - Legal.
- Once filled out, the form shows the agreement name, counterparty email, and the name, email, and optional title for each signature recipient that needed to be entered.
- The bottom of the form summarizes what was already filled in by the template.
- After the requester saves and continues, the agreement will proceed through drafting as normal, and once it reaches Ready for Signature, LinkSquares Sign will automatically send to the identified signatories, in the order identified.
Editing Signatories from the Info tab Before the Agreement Sends
Recipients collected at submission (marked Entered at submission) and recipients set on the template (marked Set on template) both appear here and can both be corrected.
A recipient set on the template from a saved contact record remains editable up until the request actually sends, at which point the values are locked in.
- Use this panel to catch a misspelled name or wrong email address, or to change whether a given signatory needs to sign versus just receive a copy, before the agreement moves to Ready for Signature and the signature request goes out.
- If a signatory needs to be adjusted after the agreement is sent for signature, a new version of the agreement can be uploaded to Internal Review to cancel the signature request. From there, the signatories can be adjusted, then putting the agreement back into Ready for Signature will initiate the autosend process.
Routing for Signature and Activity Log
Once the requester submits the agreement and it reaches Ready for Signature status, it is automatically sent for signature through LS Sign. The signature boxes on the document are placed based on the signature tokens configured on the template, so each recipient's name, title, and signature fields appear in the correct location.
From there, the activity log updates automatically as the agreement moves through the signing process. The version history at the bottom of the agreement reflects each stage: Counterparty Review, Ready for Signature, Out for Signature, Partially Signed, and finally Fully Signed, with the version number incrementing at each step.
The Activity panel on the right captures the same progression in detail:
- Each recipient viewing their signature request
- Agreeing to accept digital signatures and signing
- Followed by an "Agreement fully executed" entry once the last required signer has signed.
- Once fully signed, LS Sign also attaches the signed PDF and a signature history document (an audit trail of the signing process) to the agreement.
Summary
To set up auto-send for signature on a template:
- Make sure the underlying document contains signature tokens for each signatory.
- Turn on Auto-send for signature.
- Choose an Auto-send sender (Agreement Author, Agreement Owner, or a Specific User).
- Decide whether recipients should sign all at once or in an ordered sequence of steps.
- For any recipient who is always the same person, set their step to a Saved recipient instead of Entered at submission.
- For any signatory who should only be notified rather than required to sign, move them to the copy-only section.
Once published, agreements created from the template will collect only the information that is not already known, and LinkSquares Sign will handle sending the agreement out for signature automatically once it reaches Ready for Signature.