How to send a document for signature
Sign in, upload a PDF, add the people who need to sign, place their fields on the page, and send. Each person gets their own link by email and signs in their browser, without making an account.
Before you start
You need a PDF of the document, up to 10 MB and 200 pages, and the email address of everyone who needs to sign it. Sign in at tryparaph.com/login with your email address: we send you a code to type in, and there is no password. The first time, that makes your account.
1. Upload the PDF
Start a new document and choose the PDF. Paraph checks it is a real PDF within the limits before it creates the document, and tells you plainly if it isn't.
2. Add the people who need to sign
Add each signer by email address, with their name if you want it on the email and the certificate. You can have up to 20 signers on one document on Free, and 50 on Pro.
Then choose how they sign:
- All at once. Everyone is emailed straight away and can sign in any order.
- In order. Each person is emailed when it is their turn, and nobody can sign before the person ahead of them.
3. Place the fields
Choose a signer, then tap the page to place their fields: signature, initials, date signed, text and checkbox. Each signer's fields are in their own colour and carry their name, so you can see whose is whose. Everyone needs at least one field, or they would have nothing to do.
A date signed field fills itself in with the date the person signs, taken from our server rather than their device, so nobody types a date. Up to 200 fields fit on one document.
4. Give it a title and a message
The title and the message are shown on the signing page and in the email. A short message saying what the document is and why you are sending it helps the person on the other end trust the email.
5. Send
When you send, the document is fixed: nobody can change its fields or signers after that, because the audit trail has to describe the document people actually signed.
Paraph then:
- emails each signer their own link, from one of our email domains;
- reminds anyone who hasn't signed after 3 days, then 4 days later, then 7 days after that, up to 3 times, and lets you send a reminder yourself;
- tells you when each person signs;
- when the last person signs, emails everyone, including you, the signed PDF and a completion certificate.
A brand new account can send a handful of documents on its first day, rising over the first month, and a small number of documents are held for a check before they go out. The fair use policy explains both.