6 E-Signature Use Cases For Your Business
In the past, signing a business document could be time-consuming. You’ll need to go to the other person to get their signature or fax the paper to their office and wait for them to sign and send it back to you. Either way, the process can take a few hours to even weeks. This can slow down your business. What’s An Electronic Signature?
Fortunately, technology came up with a solution–electronic signatures. This article shares the basics of electronic signatures and their typical applications for your business.
What’s An Electronic Signature?
An electronic signature or e-signature is simply a digital form of the manual or traditional signature. Instead of signing on paper, an e-signature allows you to sign documents online without picking up a pen or printing a report.
E-signature allows for a seamless and secure signing transaction, offering better user authentication and legally binding. Also, e-signatures are recognized and legalized under different regulations in different countries, including Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA) and ESIGN Act and the electronic Identification, Authentication and Trust Services (eIDAS) regulation.
However, you need to make sure that you choose reputable e-signature service providers like jSign.com that comply with the necessary e-signature laws.
Where Can You Use E-Signature In Your Business?
Sales Contracts And Client Forms
You can utilize it in every business deal with contracts. Sales contracts are one of the most commonly signed documents in the business world. Delay in signing a sales contract can impact your business’s profits.
With e-signature, you can execute sales agreements online and close deals in just minutes or hours, even if the contract requires multiple signatories. In addition, you can easily incorporate most e-signature applications into existing sales tools like your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. This allows you to maintain complete visibility into where your sales contracts are in the signing process.
In addition, if a client needs to fill out paperwork to do business with you, an e-signature can save money and time. Paper-based liability waivers, consent forms, or policy updates often require you to generate documents for your clients to sign. Traditional paper signing can be costly and will likely result in a slow and inefficient client experience.
Today, customers are increasingly digitized. They no longer have the patience to follow analog signature processes or complete long cycles. A tedious process can be a reason to abandon a transaction and lose a lead. With an e-signature, you can solve these issues and create a seamless experience for your client.
It is important for companies that offer custom-made goods or services, such as print shops or web development firms. An e-signature allows you to file approvals with ease and move to complete your client’s order, thus preventing wasting time.
Invoices
Most people think that invoices don’t need signatures. However, these invoices aren’t legal documents without a signature and are just a list of services and products sent to a client to request payment. In most cases, clients can pay unsigned invoices without a problem.
However, a signature shows that your client read, understood, and agreed to your invoice document’s terms. And in the world of invoicing, having definite proof of the client’s acknowledgment and agreement can make the payment process more straightforward. Also, if something goes wrong, a signed invoice can make it easier to collect payment. There won’t be any dispute since the client already agreed to the terms and is legally bound to pay the invoice.
With e-signatures, you can speed up the process, allowing you and your client to sign invoices remotely legally.
Vendor Agreements
Most businesses work with a vendor or supplier. To create solid relationships with your vendors or suppliers, you need to spend significant effort and time managing the partnership and coordinating procurement tasks.
You should move from paper-driven processes to digital workflows to improve purchasing and business negotiations. It accelerates the procure-to-process while minimizing the risks of errors and costs associated with traditional paper document processing. It also prevents delays in your orders that could significantly impact your logistics.
Tax Forms
Historically, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) required traditional hand-to-paper signatures for tax returns, election statements, and other tax-relevant documents. However, with today’s digital world, the IRS has now allowed e-signing.
With a reliable e-signature provider, you can save time during the busy tax season and seamlessly sign and file tax documents. Also, You can now send and sign IRS forms electronically, ensuring that you comply with the latest IRS regulations for e-signatures.
Employee Onboarding
Hiring a new employee involves a lot of documents–employee contracts, non-compete agreements, automatic paycheck deposit forms, benefit enrolments, and many more. However, Reviewing and signing these documents can become more problematic if you’re hiring a remote or virtual employee.
However, with digital documents and e-signature, you can process these forms securely and quickly. Documents can filled out and signed electronically. They were then followed by fast dissemination of contracts and human resources (HR) policies back to employees.
Non-Disclosure Agreements
A non-disclosure agreement (NDA), also known as a confidentiality agreement, is a legal contract that establishes a confidential relationship between businesses. A non-disclosure agreement allows you to do business with third parties with confidence in a competitive business world. It helps prevent fraud and loss of intellectual property and is legally binding in court.
Utilizing an e-signature allows for the easier signing of these agreements via mobile device or a laptop for your partner businesses. With a reputable e-signature provider, you can ensure secure document signing to maintain the integrity of the signed documentation. There’s also an audit trail generated during the signing process. This ensures that you have legal evidence at your disposal in the event of a legal dispute.
Take Away
As the adage says, ‘Time is gold.’
To maximize profits, you should utilize every second properly. If you waste your time waiting for document signatures, it will negatively impact your business. To avoid this, consider using e-signatures that allow for the seamless and faster signing of business-related documents.
Regardless of the type of paperwork you’re involved in, e-signatures can help save you time and money. So, switch to e-signature now and experience faster processes, ultimately contributing to your business growth.
