BladeLaw is often faced with the question as to how a client can easily sign an electronic document. If you have a printer, there probably isn't a problem. You print the document, sign it and then scan the signed version. If you just said you don't have a scanner, or you don't have a printer, the following advice is for you. If you just want to avoid having to print and scan the whole of the document but are happy to do that with the signature page, scroll to the bottom of this page for advice on that.
If you have a printer but not a scanner, you need a scanner app on your phone. If you don't have a phone, we will have to revert to paper! Otherwise you can use one of the following versions of Adobe Scan depending on which type of phone you have:
The instructions in those apps should be fairly self-explanatory.
If you don't have a printer, you need a PDF editor app. Again, you can use one of the following versions of Adobe Reader:
After that, follow the following steps (written using Android app but iPhone should be very similar). Note that you may be asked to grant various permissions to the apps as you go along. Note also that the illustration links below open in a new tab so you will have to either switch tabs or close the newly opened tab to get back to this page. It's probably easier to do that on a computer:
- Take a piece of paper and sign it. ILLUSTRATION
- Open the email containing the PDF to be signed on your phone. Tap the attachment to open the PDF. Having installed Acrobat Reader, the PDF should now be open in that app.
- Tap on "Fill & Sign" near the bottom right-hand corder. ILLUSTRATION
- Tap on the pen nib in the bottom right-hand corner. ILLUSTRATION
- The first time you use this tool, you will have to add a signature to use. Tap on the + to do that. ILLUSTRATION
- Now tap on the camera symbol. ILLUSTRATION
- Take the photograph of the piece of paper that you signed earlier. ILLUSTRATION
- Pull in the crop symbols to frame just the signature and then click "Done". ILLUSTRATION
- Click "Done" again on the next screen. ILLUSTRATION
- Tap in the document where you want your signature to appear. ILLUSTRATION
- You can then slide the signature more precisely where you want it and use the double sided arrow button to change its size. Then you click the tick symbol at the top left of the screen (not the one at the bottom!). ILLUSTRATION
- Tap the share icon. ILLUSTRATION
- Tap "Send a Copy". ILLUSTRATION
- Finally, pick the email app that you want to use to send back your signed document (or to send it to yourself for later use). You may need to swipe to scroll to find the app you want. ILLUSTRATION
How to return a whole signed document after just printing and scanning the signature page.
Go back to the orginal email that you received that had the document attached. Instead of clicking reply, click forward. Now highlight the email address from the email you received and copy it into the "To:" box. Now attach your scan or photo of the signature page. You should now have an email, ready to go with two attachments, the original, complete document and the signature page. Press send!
None of the above is intended to be IT advice or endorsement of any product or service. It is just an account of my experience.
- Signing