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January 19th 2012 – The development of electronic signature and esignature solutions is changing the way companies do business, but some companies are hesitant to adopt them because they question electronic signatures legality.
Following are tips from the leading electronic signature provider Sertifi, for electronic signature deployments:
- It must show the person had intent to sign the record. Intent incorporates the recording of actions taken by signers that show they knew and agreed that they were signing, and intended to be bound by their signature.
- It is an electronic sound, mark or symbol.
- It is logically associated with, or affixed to a record. This means the system managing the signing must be able to attach the signature to the document in a way that ensures the signature cannot be removed or modified.
- It must be attributable to a person. When the signer makes a mark in a distinctive manner or correctly answers a series of security questions, the writing becomes attributable to the signer.
Traditionally, documents were drafted on paper and the client authenticated them by signing in ink. Since its adoption in 1996 by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws, 46 states in the U.S. have enacted the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act. These laws set legal requirements for electronic signatures.
An esignature has been as legally binding as a hard copy signature since the Federal Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act was signed in 2000.
Sertifi is very fortunate to be part of a new technology that is helping to transform the way people and business sign and send agreements. This market has been a long time coming, and is not always an easy transition as we have been signing documents on paper for thousands of years. As part of this new market www.sertifi.com was featured in Chicago Business ( Crain’s ). Here is an excerpt from the article:
http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20111215/BLOGS06/111219869/web-of-influence-chicagos-innovative-tech-companies-feed-off-each
“The most obvious success story at the center of this, of course, is Groupon, with its roughly 2,000 employees. It’s been great to see them grow and hire more people, but what’s even greater is that they’re far from the only innovator in town. Seeing the growth of local companies as diverse as GrubHub, a food delivery service, and Sertifi, which speeds up contract agreements through e-signing and tracking, has been extremely invigorating.”
The electronic signature market is continuing to evolve and we here at Sertifi are preparing for a fantastic 2012. We also have some very exciting new features coming out in the next few months.
Electronic signature ( electronic signatures ) and digital signatures are very different and use different types of technologies. For example, authentication used in electronic signatures are typically email based ( Sertifi technology ) while digital signatures are PKI based. As more and more businesses go paperless, the efficiency of getting documents executed on email based electronic signatures are becoming the default standard for companies such as Microsoft, Careerbuilder, Intercall and many others. Digital Signatures, not so much.
Here are some definitions from the dictionary:
Electronic Signature or eSignature:
An electronic signature, or e-signature, is any electronic means that indicates either that a person adopts the contents of an electronic message, or more broadly that the person who claims to have written a message is the one who wrote it (and that the message received is the one that was sent).
E-Signature
The term e-signature, or esignature is a common abbreviation of the longer term electronic signature and has the same meaning.
Digital Signature
A digital signature scheme typically consists of three algorithms:
- A key generation algorithm that selects a private key uniformly at random from a set of possible private keys. The algorithm outputs the private key and a corresponding public key.
- A signing algorithm that, given a message and a private key, produces a signature.
- A signature verifying algorithm that, given a message, public key and a signature, either accepts or rejects the message’s claim to authenticity.
Two main properties are required. First, a signature generated from a fixed message and fixed private key should verify the authenticity of that message by using the corresponding public key. Secondly, it should be computationally infeasible to generate a valid signature for a party who does not possess the private key. 
Online Signature
The term online signature is colloquial and describes any kind of signature created online. It does not imply any criteria for authentication, security, or defensibility. To learn more about eSignatures and electronic signature contact Sertifi at Sertifi.com
As we have seen over the last few years, combining the power of Salesforce.com with electronic signatures ( eSignatures ) has provided powerful results to our customers such as the Washington Post, Cricket and Intercall. We are proud to partner with Libra On Demand who has built an application on top of the Force.com platform. From the Libra Website:
Libra OnDemand is a leading Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) provider of hospitality solutions natively built using cloud technologies, with a comprehensive suite of affordable, easy to use, web applications:
- CRM & Email Marketing: a complete 360° view of each customer
- Concierge Desk: customer service in a Single Guest Itinerary
- Sales, Groups & Events: comprehensive management and organization
- Loyalty & Rewards: flexible, innovative customer recognition
- Libra Customer Portal: custom designed, consumer-facing websites
- Libra HMS Portal: mobile device accessible, employee collaboration tools
We recently did a release with Libra in regards to our electronic signature solution. http://www.hospitalitynet.org/news/154000320/4053580.html
Sertifi has been serving healthcare customers by automating the agreement signing process, lowering the cost for patient care. Sertifi was recognized here where you can read the press release and our progress in the healthcare market. Here is a quote from one of our customers:
“Yvonna Fields, vice president of administration for Home Care Health Services, says the company was drawn to the Sertifi solution for its ability to automate the complex medical order workflow. Staff was trained and the system was operational in one day.
“After using the service for six months, we have demonstrated that our referring physicians who order our home care services have eliminated the enormous paper process we had previously burdened them with,” Fields says. “Sertifi has helped us improve our efficiency, accuracy and re-work while reducing paper management and related overhead costs.”
Sertifi for Salesforce solution leverages Sertif’s leading API to allow eSignatures to run entirely and transparently from within Salesforce. Simply click on a new link in Opportunities or Contact entitled “Send eContract”, attach contract, email address of the signers and within one easy step the contract will be sent out for eSignature.
Once the contract is sent, Sertifi for Salesforce enables clients to track and manage the agreement. Status such as when the contract was sent, opened and signed will be stored inside the opportunity. Once signed, a PDF copy is also automatically attached to the Contact and Opportunity for that contract. Never lose another contract or manually upload or scan signed customer contracts again. Sertifi does it all for you — automatically.
One of the many questions that we receive in regards to electronic signatures and eSignatures is ” will my customer sign electronically or will they choose to print, sign and fax?” This is a very fair question and something that can be done through a pilot program with Sertifi. Through other pilot programs we have completed with many of our customers including Pitney Bowes, Microsoft and many other – we have seen that when presented with the option, 93% of customers will choose to electronically sign over printing, signing and faxing.
Another interesting piece of data, is that over 95% of the fortune 500 have signed a document with Sertifi. We are seeing many large firms adopt eSignature and even more accepting and preferring to complete and sign documents electronically. As our business environment becomes more and more mobile, we need to provide our customers with the easiest and quickest way to sign and agreement.
In a online environment where transactions between two or more parties take place, the protection of data is crucial for all parties involved. In some cases the actual signing process may be adequate and meet E-Signature requirements, but accessibility could cause problems.
Take the case of Karr vs. Dillard Store Services, where a employee brought a suit claiming race discrimination, and the employer attempted to force a signature of the customer on a required arbitration agreement, via the company’s in-house built technology. Although the actual agreement had the employees signature on it, the employee denied knowingly signing the contract. Later on it was learned that the employer had repeatedly insisted on the employee’s signature. The Electronic Signature process used by the employer was E-Sign compliant, but a case was made since the system was set up in a way where the employees supervisor had access to the employee’s account and could actually log in and sign as the employee. Moreover, the plaintiff claimed that her supervisor signed the arbitration agreement, without the consent of the employee, during a “demonstration” of how the technology works. What the court was deciding on, in essence, was a electronic signature created by someone logged in to the plaintiff’s account. The court declined to attribute the purported electronic signature to the plaintiff and thus the arbitration agreement was unenforceable, reasoned by inadequate procedures to maintain passwords and restrict access to unauthorized parties.
Restricting access to unauthorized user and having a strong security level is becoming increasingly important and in this case we can see that access to users within the system must also be restricted to some extent. With Sertifi you can be assured that all accounts are only accessible only by authorized members since users can only retrieve their own passwords and “Super Administrative” access is limited to files signed and sent by users, not the actual signature. We are constantly increasing our security standards making sure our customers are in the safest environment possible when signing.
Forrester Research is one of the leading market research companies providing proprietary research data for businesses and markets worldwide. In the latest edition of “Inquiry Spotlight”, a quarterly release on the latest market trends, the topic of discussion is Electronic Signatures. Specifically, how companies implement e-signatures, which markets are using e-sign the most, and who the major vendors in the Esign marketspace are.
Sertifi is mentioned among the preferred SaaS vendors for offering a economical and efficient way to get agreements signed fast and with very little implementation costs as compared to long-incumbent e-signature vendors who process and store documents in-house. In addition, the high costs of infrastructure and maintenance for a in-house application would make a service like this inefficient for most companies.
Regardless of how electronic signatures are implemented, the major point was made clear – implementing Electronic Signatures increases cost efficiency while saving companies time and money.
In 2008, Sertifi introduced a Address Book feature built specifically for customers sending contracts to a same set of signers. The newest version of the address book has been treated to some major visual and structural reconstruction offering more options such as the ability to edit contact information, create groups of signers, quickly add and delete contacts to a transaction straight from “Create a Request” page. Here is how it works:
1. On your homepage you will see a new tab called “Address Book.”
2. The “Address Book” tab will take you to a page where you can add new contacts, edit your contacts, create groups and manage.
3. Once your contacts have been added, you can use these address book contacts for first, second, non-signers, etc. When creating a new signature request, you will see two buttons – one to add contacts from your address book and one to add new contacts to your address book.
Clicking on “My Address Book” will give you a list of your contacts and groups where you select the desired recipients. If you would like to quickly add a recipient to your address book without leaving the “Create a Request” page, you may do so by clicking on “Add to Address Book”. This option can be utilized each time you enter a email that has not already been emailed a request for signature from your account.
Clients using the new Address Book are already seeing the great value in having contacts available in the account. Requests are now taking seconds to send and the account management process couldn’t be easier. For more information on the Address Book and other great features offered, contact our Sales Team today!
