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A recipient cannot finish signing
Required fields, expired links and browser problems, and how to clear each.
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The usual cause is a required field that is still empty, which keeps the Finish button greyed out. The signing page counts them for the recipient, at the top of the screen: N required fields remaining. Start there, then look at links that will not open, then at the browser they are using.
An envelope is the document you sent out for signature, together with the people asked to sign it.
Finish will not light up
Ask them to look at the counter in the header. If it reads anything above zero, there is at least one box left.
The boxes still needed pulse gently and carry a label such as Sign here, Initial here or Date. Anything optional says so and does not pulse, so a page of identical looking boxes is not as ambiguous as it appears. If a field is hidden behind something, or two overlap, the document menu lists every field and jumps to it. On a wide screen it is already open down the side; on a phone or a tablet it is behind the button at the top left of the signing page.
Remind them to scroll to the end of every document in the set. A required signature on the last page of the third document is the classic one.
They pressed Finish and it did not go through
Pressing Finish opens a panel headed Complete Signing with a tick box and a button reading Agree & Sign. The button stays disabled until the tick box is ticked. Consenting to sign electronically is a step in its own right, and it is recorded as one.
If a red message appears saying Couldn't complete signing, it names what is still outstanding. Close the panel, tap each highlighted field on the document, and try again.
The link says it is no longer valid
Signing links do not last forever, and they are finished the moment their work is done.
- It has expired. An envelope you did not give an expiry date to expires 30 days after it was sent. See Deadlines and chasing people up.
- It has already been used. Once somebody has signed or declined, their link has done its job.
- The envelope was withdrawn. See Cancel an envelope someone has already opened.
- It is not their turn. With sequential signing the message names whose turn it currently is, and tells them they will be emailed when it reaches them. See Choosing who signs first.
For an expired envelope, send the document again as a new envelope. For one that is completed or declined, see I sent it with a mistake in it.
The document will not load at all
A message reading Unable to Load Document means the page could not fetch or display the file. Ask them to try, in this order:
- Open the link in a proper browser rather than the preview window inside a mail app. On a phone, long press the link and choose to open it in the browser.
- Update the browser, or try a different one. An up to date mainstream browser is what the signing page is built for.
- Turn off ad blockers and script blockers for the page, and try again.
- Try a different network, such as a mobile connection instead of the office one. A strict company firewall can block the component that draws the pages.
Reopening the same link after any of these is safe. Nothing they had already filled in is lost.
Access codes
If you protected the document with an access code, five wrong attempts lock that recipient out for fifteen minutes. Read them the code rather than emailing it, wait the fifteen minutes, and try again. See Protecting a document with an access code.