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University of Florida

FAQs / Common Issues

Any faculty or staff member with a valid GatorLink account may use the service for business-related purposes.

Go to the DocuSign website https://www.docusign.com/

Select Log In in the top right corner

Use Gatorlink + @ufl.edu email as the username to be redirected to the UF authentication page

Use your Gatorlink credentials to login

If you’ve confirmed that you have the UF_N_DocuSign_Author or UF_N_DocuSign_Sender role:

  1. Has it been at least 3 business days since your DSA requested your Author or Sender Role?
  2. Check to see to see if you are on the correct account. Note: If you’re not a research user (UF_N_DOCUSIGN_CFR21_11_AUTHOR) follow the process on this page to toggle to the Standard account.
  3. Set your Default Account

There is no cost to use UFDocuSign.

Please view How DocuSign Works.

In an effort to support remote work, you can now include some restricted information, including PII and PHI in documents routed for signature via UF DocuSign. Completed documents will no longer be sent as an email attachment, only a link in the email. Read more here.

An electronic signature, or eSignature, is an electronic sound, symbol or process associated with a contract or other record and adopted by a person with the intent to sign the record.

Electronic signatures are used for many kinds of documents and transactions, for personal and business use. Some examples include contracts, agreements, loans, leases, forms and orders. UFDocuSign offers services customized to the administrative needs of UF Staff, Researchers, and Faculty.

UFDocuSign supports Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer 11+ and Windows Edge. Visit DocuSign system requirements for additional information.

After logging into UFDocuSign, click on the Need Help or Quick Tips links to access online support and resources. You can also view the Contact section of this site to email the team.

To learn how to upload and send a document, view this page.

You can use UFDocuSign to sign virtually any type of document: .doc, .docx, .pdf, .xls, .xlsx, .txt and more. UFDocuSign is integrated into many of the tools and business systems you already use, including Microsoft Office 365 (Microsoft Outlook, Word and SharePoint), Box.com and Microsoft OneDrive.

Yes, but please keep in mind that UFDocuSign is to be used for business purposes only.

If you need to send a single document to many individuals, you can use the Add Bulk Recipient button on the Send page. This feature is similar to mail-merge in MS Word. You will be prompted to upload a CSV file containing the data to merge into the document. It is best to prepare such documents in advance and upload them as templates from the Manage page because you will need to place the tags and name them with the same names as the headers in your CSV file. Full details on bulk sending are available here.

A DocuSign envelope is a container used to send one or more documents for signature. You could think of an envelope as an email. Envelopes can contain multiple documents and can be sent to several recipients. The documents can have multiple pages.

The maximum total file size for an envelope is 25 MB. There is no maximum number of recipients for an envelope.

Tags are used to indicate locations on a document where the recipient needs to take an action and to provide information for the recipient. Some examples include: Signature, Date Signed, Radio Button and Check Box. More information can be found here.

When someone sends you a document for your electronic signature, you will first receive an email from UFDocuSign on behalf of the sender. For instructions on how to sign the document, view this page.

Use Dashboards in UFDocuSign to check the status of signatures and envelopes. For more information on how to use your dashboard to check statuses or run reports, see this page.

The Manage tab allows you to view your envelopes and documents. In the Envelopes section, you can view envelopes that are in your Inbox, Sent, Draft and Deleted folders. Also, the Search Folders section enables you to view documents that are Waiting for my Signature, Expiring Soon, Out for Signature and Completed. Just click the Document button to display the document.

Use the Manage tab in UFDocuSign to check document status. You can also check the status by using the Search Envelopes feature, which is located in the upper right-hand corner. To learn more about the document statuses, visit this page.

UFDocuSign’s reporting feature provides an easy way for users and account administrators to see information about their account. Reports can be found in the Reports section in UFDocuSign. To learn more about available reports, see DocuSign reports.

The best way to prevent a document from being returned incomplete is to make all of the fields required where you are expecting input from a signer or signers. Each signer will not be able to move the document forward until all required fields are completed.

This is likely due to default browser settings and required cookies. If people in the department are unable to complete signing, there may be a problem with popup blockers or required cookies.

How to clear cache/cookies: https://support.docusign.com/s/articles/How-do-I-clear-the-Cache-and-Cookies-in-my-Browser?language=en_US  

Security settings:

  • Allow per session cookies and popups for DocuSign
  • User accessing the Internet behind a Proxy Server must enable HTTP 1.1 settings through a proxy connection
  • Firewall settings must allow access to the server: https://docucdn-a.akamaihd.net. DocuSign uses Akamai as a content delivery service to enhance our application's performance.

A template allows you to create a standard document where recipient roles, signing information and commonly used fields can be set. Templates are helpful if you frequently send the same or similar documents.

Creating templates in UFDocuSign can be done through the Manage tab. Click the dropdown arrow on the Create button to select a template. See DocuSign Quick Guide for Templates.

You can create a self service template by using a PowerForm. Please refer to the PowerForms section for more information.

Instructions can be found here.

Yes. Users can send a request to UF-DocuSign@ufl.edu and ask for the UFDocuSign administrator to change ownership of a template. This is useful when someone leaves the university or goes on extended leave. Note: Please make certain to state the Template Name, original template owner and who should be the new owner when requesting the change.

If your UFDocuSign account is active, the envelopes in your account will be stored in UFDocuSign for 90 days. When the signing process is complete, upload the final document into OnBase or your department’s document archival solution.

UFDocuSign aggregates all of your uploaded files into a PDF for a secure signing experience. You can add files in any of our many supported file formats, such as Word documents, spreadsheets or images, and UFDocuSign brings them all together into a single secure PDF. You can view the document image directly in the application or you can download the PDF file for viewing, sharing and storing.

When you download a document from UFDocuSign, it presents the current state of your document. Only completed documents show the signing information. All of the completed signing fields are included on the PDF. For incomplete documents, the PDF includes only the files that you added to the document; none of the signing fields are visible on the PDF.

To download your document, click the Download icon at the top of the page and select Separate PDFs or Combined PDF, depending on which format you would like. Separate PDFs gives you a zip file containing all of the files in the UFDocuSign document as individual PDFs. The selected file is downloaded to your local Downloads folder.

UFDocuSign offers bank-grade security and operations. Learn more about DocuSign document security.

You can view documents directly in UFDocuSign or you can download the PDF file for viewing, sharing, and printing. From the Manage section in UFDocuSign, locate the document that you want to download or print. Then click the document to view it. To download your document, click the Download icon and select options of Combined Document or Archive of all Documents. To print your document, click the Print icon. Note: When you download or print a PDF, it presents the current state of your document. Only completed documents show the signing information.

The default notification for envelope status produces a lot of email. It is possible to reduce, or even eliminate, these notifications. To change the default notifications, you can go to the Preferences page and then the Manage Email Notifications tab. You can change your notifications to meet your specific needs there.

In most cases, the document was correctly sent to the cc recipient's DocuSign account, but they simply didn’t receive the notification.

To resolve this, recipients must do the following:

 https://support.docusign.com/en/articles/How-do-I-manage-my-email-notifications

Go to My Preferences > Signing and Sending > Notifications.

Make sure to select (check) the top 3 selections;

  • I have an envelope to sign
  • An envelope is completed
  • I am a copy-only recipient

When future envelopes are sent to those cc recipients, they will receive the email notifications.

It can take up to 2 business days after your DSA requests the role before your permissions are updated in the UF DocuSign system.

Not sure who your DSA is? To access the DSA listing, visit: http://files.it.ufl.edu/identity/DSA.pdf.

Example: I usually sign documents in my UF DocuSign account, but someone sent me a document to sign but addressed it to my departmental account(example@ufsa.ufl.edu) Now I have different documents across these two accounts. How can I merge these two accounts?

Since the departmental account is external to the UF DocuSign system, you will need to:

  1. Contact DocuSign to merge the accounts or transfer your information to your UFL.edu account at: (https://support.docusign.com/contactSupport), OR
  2. Open the envelope you want to move and select "Forward" -> then address it to your ufl.edu account as a carbon copy recipient.

Contact the sender and recommend entering your Gatorlink address to their DS Contacts list.  This eliminates the need to research a UF user's Gatorlink email.

Confirm with the sender that the document wasn't sent to your email alias ending with ufl.edu. The system must authenticate you using your actual Gatorlink email/credential. The sender can simply open the in-process envelope and select the "Correct" option to re-enter your correct (Gatorlink) address. They will need to click "Resend" to resume the signing ceremony. This option also eliminates the need to void an envelope that already has some completed signatures.

“Fillable form” and “Active XFA Form” PDF files will not upload properly for use with UFDocuSign. To work around this difficulty, fill out the form in Adobe Acrobat and print it to a PDF file (can be chosen from the Print dialog box in Acrobat). Then, upload the “printed” file, which should work with no issue.

Avoid using PDF files larger than 5 MB with UFDocuSign. In Adobe Acrobat Pro, you can use Save As to save the file as a reduced size PDF or as an optimized PDF, both of which will allow you to reduce the file size.

Due to the insecure nature of email and the increased need to accommodate Sensitive/Restricted Data, UFDocuSign will no longer attach completed documents in emails.

There are 2 ways to access your completed documents:

1. Click the document link in the last email notification received

2. Log into your UF account (Using Gatorlink) credentials at (account.docusign.com) > Click continue > enter Gatorlink password > Press "Company Login". Click Manage tab (Inbox) to navigate to all Documents (Envelopes) OR under Quick Views, Click Action Required to find Documents awaiting your response.

Emails coming from UFDocuSign will be sent from "dse_NA3 @ docusign . net" without the spaces.

If you are ever unsure of an email, you can log in directly to DocuSign to check your pending envelopes.