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Templates and the document editor, start to finish

This guide follows a document from where it starts to the envelope it’s sent in: choosing a starting point, writing or opening it in the document editor, making a template of it from a Word file or a PDF, using the template, and what each plan includes. Each part links to the guide with the full detail: Templates, The document editor, The PDF editor and Send your first document.

A template is a document you send often, set up once: who signs it, the fields they fill in, and placeholders for the details that change each time, such as a name, an address or a fee. The document editor writes and changes Word documents in your browser. On Solo and up the two work together: a template made from a Word file keeps its wording, so you can change it in the browser, and parts of it can be left in or out each time it’s used.

Choose where to start

A template can start from a PDF, a Word file, a document you write in the document editor, or the template library. Which suits you depends on the document.

If you have the document in Word, start from the Word file on Solo and up: a long name wraps onto the next line rather than being written smaller, and you can fix a typo without uploading it again. Start from a PDF when its layout must stay exactly as it is.

You can also start from + Add blank document, an empty page to place fields on, or from an envelope you’ve already set up: open it under Send & Sign and choose Save as template. See Other ways to start one.

The template library

On Solo and up, choose Template library on the Templates page, under Send & Sign, or on the first step of a new envelope. It has two kinds of card:

• Starting templates, with their fields already placed. Each is a Word document, so you can change its wording with Edit wording: its details are variables, and some of its clauses are optional, for you to keep or leave out each time you use it. A note in square brackets at the top says it’s a starting template, not legal advice: delete it before you send. Until you do, Use template and the envelope remind you. Wording that a regulation sets word for word is locked, so it can’t be typed over (see Set it up).
• Forms the law sets, such as a residential tenancy agreement. Open the form opens the regulator’s own page in a new tab, and nothing is copied into your workspace. The card’s last line says what to do with the form: usually, upload it completed to send it for signing.

• Each template’s card says where its words came from, its content date and what it isn’t suitable for, with Report a problem to tell us about one. One adapted from someone else’s material credits each source, with links to the source and its licence.
• The first time you take a template, tick I understand under the notice at the top of the library: they’re general starting drafts, not legal advice, and you check and change the wording before you use it. You’re asked once in each workspace, and again if the notice changes.
• Start session adds the template to your templates, active, and opens Use template for this send’s details. Save as template adds it as a draft and opens it, to change before you use it. Either way it counts as one of your templates.

On the Free plan the library says it’s on Solo and up, with a link to the plans. See Templates: the template library.

Write or open a document

On Solo and up, the document editor writes and changes Word documents in your browser, much as Word does. Use a computer or tablet: on a phone the page says Use a computer or tablet to edit documents.

1. Choose Document editor in the menu, then New document; or choose Write a document on the dashboard, under Send & Sign or Templates, or on the first step of a new envelope.
2. Start typing, or choose Open a Word file to open a .docx, .doc or .rtf from your computer. A PDF can’t be opened here: the PDF editor adds over a PDF’s pages instead.

A document written this way is a document of its own, which you can save for your workspace, even when you start it from a new envelope or the Templates page: it isn’t added to that envelope, and it doesn’t make a template. To write a template’s document, start from the template: see Make a template from a Word document.

Formatting, tables and pictures

Headings, bold, italic and underline, lists that renumber themselves, tables, pictures, links, headers and footers, page numbers and footnotes work as they do in Word. The editor offers five fonts: Calibri, Cambria, Arial, Times New Roman and Courier New, drawn with fonts of the same widths, so lines break where Word breaks them. A file in any other font is shown in the nearest of the five, and the page says which. See Fonts.

When a Word file has something the editor can’t show, such as text in some shapes, a line under the buttons says so, and if saving, making a PDF or sending would leave content out, you’re asked first, once for the document. A file the editor refuses says why: for example, one with a password, one with tracked changes (accept or reject them in Word first), or one past its limits, such as more than 10 pictures or 500 pages. See What the editor shows a file without.

Spell check and pasting

The editor checks your spelling in Australian English as you type. Right-click a word underlined in red and choose the word you meant, or Ignore Once or Ignore All. Spell check passes over field tags, variables, and email and web addresses. See Spell check.

Text you paste from Word, Google Docs or a web page keeps its formatting: headings, lists, tables, links, and the pictures that are in what you copied. A picture it only links to, as most on web pages and in Google Docs are, isn’t brought in: copy the picture on its own and paste it. Paste with Ctrl+V (Cmd+V on a Mac). To keep its formatting, what you paste is read by SignSwifly’s server in Australia, and not kept there. See Pasting from other programs.

Save it for your workspace

• Save asks for a name the first time; each save after that is the document’s next version. Once it’s saved, Save as… makes a copy under a new name.
• Saved documents are shared with everyone in your workspace, under Document editor in the menu. A workspace can keep 200, and 1 GB in all, every version counted.
• Each one keeps its last 10 versions. Versions lists who saved each and when: open the newest to edit it, or an older one read-only; download any of them; or put an older one back as the newest.
• Nothing is kept until you save, and closing the tab doesn’t ask first, so save or download before you leave.
• Once your workspace keeps 20 or more, Search saved documents finds one by its name or by who saved it last. To delete several at once, tick them, or tick Select all shown, then choose Delete selected. Deleting a saved document deletes every version of it, for good.

See Save, and the versions kept and Finding one, and deleting several.

Download it, or send it for signing

• Download Word (.docx) saves the document to your computer. Download PDF makes a PDF in the same fonts the signed PDF will use.
• To have its fields placed for you, type a field tag where each signature, initials, date or name goes, such as [[Signature:signer1]] or [[DateSigned:signer2]]: signer1 is the first person who signs, signer2 the second, and so on, and a tag with any other name starts as the first signer’s. Then choose Send for signing. A draft envelope is made and the send wizard opens on it. Once you’ve added the people who sign, Place fields says This document has field tags and offers a field for each tag, whose signer you can change. See Send for signing.

To send the same document again and again, make it a template from that draft. In the send wizard, add the people who sign, take the fields Place fields offers, and save them with Next: Review or Save as draft. Then, under Send & Sign, open the draft’s row and choose Save as template. The document stays a Word document in the template when its fields and the field tags in its wording match one for one: every field came from a tag still in the wording, and every tag has its field. Otherwise, or when it has text in a script SignSwifly can’t yet draw from a Word file, or is too large to keep editable, it becomes a fixed PDF with its fields where they were, and the page says why. On Free it’s always a fixed PDF, and nothing is said.

Make a template from a Word document

On Solo and up, a template made from a Word document keeps its Word file. Its details are written into its sentences, its signers’ fields come from tags in its wording, and clauses can be left in or out each time it’s used. The full rules are in Templates: Word templates.

Set it up

1. Open Templates, choose + New template, name it, and choose Create & edit.
2. On Details & documents, add the envelope subject and message your signers will see, then choose Next: Recipients.
3. On Recipients & variables, choose + Add recipient slot for each person who signs, witnesses or is copied in, and give each a Role label, such as “Employee”. Once the template has a Word document, each person who signs or witnesses has a tag key made from their label, shown on their card: employee, a second “Employee” employee_2, and with no label signer1 or witness1. A key never changes, and a label can’t be changed: to change one, remove the person and add them again, which takes their tags out of the wording and gives them a key from the new label. Add variables under Template variables, or make them in the editor as you write.
4. Back on Details & documents (the numbered steps at the top of the page), add your Word file and choose Edit wording on its menu, or choose Write a document to start a new, empty one (A4, Calibri 11). A Word document shows a Word badge. The document editor opens with the template’s tools first on its toolbar: Insert variable, New variable, Signer field, Signature block and Make optional. When you’re done, Save, then Back to template.

If you write the document before adding anyone, Signer field says “This template has no signers yet. Add one in step 2 of the template, then come back to put their fields in the wording.” Save, choose Back to template, add them, and come back with Edit wording.

In a template from the library, Edit wording highlights the drafting note in square brackets when it opens, for you to delete. Wording that a regulation sets word for word is locked: it can’t be typed over, and the template’s tools won’t put anything into it or make it part of an optional clause: “This wording is set by law and kept as written. Put it outside the locked passage.”

Variables: the details that change

A variable is a placeholder in three pairs of braces, such as {{{employee_name}}}. Its name can have the letters A to Z, digits and underscores, with no spaces, up to 50 characters. Insert variable puts one of the template’s variables at the cursor, kept together as one piece: its letters can’t be typed over, but it can be deleted whole. New variable makes one first: text, rich text, a picture (Image, in step 2’s list) or a table. You can also type placeholders in Word before you upload the file. A rich text or table placeholder goes on a line of its own.

When the template is used, each value is written into its sentence at full size: a long company name wraps onto the next line, and a table runs across pages with its heading row repeated. A placeholder that names none of the template’s variables stops the template being activated until you add the variable or take the placeholder out.

Signer fields: where each person signs

Signer field puts a field for one of the template’s signers or witnesses at the cursor, as a field tag. Choose whose field it is, and its kind: Signature, Initials, Date signed, Name, Text box, Tick box, Drop-down, Radio button, Approve or decline, or File upload. Signature block puts in a line to sign on, with room above it, and “Signed by” with the signer’s role label and the date they sign under it.

Tags can also be typed in Word before you upload, in two pairs of square brackets, with the signer’s tag key after the colon:

• A second field of the same kind for the same person needs a name of its own, such as [[Signature:employee:2]].
• Tags go in the body of the document, not in a header, footer, text box or note. Each tag becomes a field, and the tag itself is taken out of the page signers see. A tag that names nobody, or a viewer, makes no field, and stops the template being activated.
• A field’s box sits on its tag and grows upwards from the tag’s line. A signature box is about three lines of text tall, so leave two or three empty lines above a Signature tag, or put it on the signing line itself. Signature block leaves exactly that room. See Typing a field tag in Word yourself.

Optional clauses: Make optional

1. Select the wording that’s sometimes left out, and choose Make optional.
2. Under Optional clause, keep A new optional clause and name it: letters, numbers and underscores, up to 30, such as guarantee. Leave In unless the sender leaves it out ticked if it’s usually in, or untick it if it’s usually left out. Or choose a clause you’ve made already, so this wording goes in or out with it.
3. Choose what’s optional, from the shapes your selection allows: Whole paragraphs, Only the selected words, or The whole table cell. The dialog shows where the clause will start and end, by the first few words of each. With whole paragraphs and a heading just above them, the heading is offered too, never ticked: tick it if what you selected is all the wording under that heading, so a clause left out doesn’t leave its heading behind.

An optional clause can be in the document or in its header or footer, not in a footnote or a text box, and it can’t hold another optional clause. Each one is listed with the template’s variables. See Edit wording.

Undo after Make optional takes the clause out of the wording again, and a clause you made new for it comes off the template too, unless you’ve saved it; then it goes at your next save. It stays while the template has another Word document that may use it. Redo puts both back. The line under the buttons says which clause went or came back.

Save, and what the page checks

Choose Save. Each field moves with its words, so changing a sentence never leaves a signature box floating, and the line under the buttons says how many fields new tags added or removed tags took away. A save asks first (Save without them?) when it would take out a whole table, picture, footnote or the like, a variable, field tag or optional clause put in with the toolbar’s tools, or every word of a header or footer; other changes to the words never ask. After each save here, the page lists above the document:

• Publishing will refuse the template until these are fixed: for example, a tag that names no signer, a placeholder that names none of the template’s variables, a tag spelt wrongly (with the nearest correct tag, when there is one), a tag in a header or footer, the same tag twice, or a rich text or table placeholder that isn’t on a line of its own.
• Worth a look: what’s allowed but may not be what you meant, such as a field whose box covers some words above or beside it, or a tag that’s underlined, where the line would stay on the page once the tag is taken out, or the library’s drafting note still in the wording. An optional clause on the template that no wording has is listed here too, since the switch senders see for it would change nothing: “The optional clause probation isn’t in the document’s wording, so the switch senders see for it changes nothing. Make some wording optional with it in Edit wording, or remove it in step 2.”

As soon as you add a Word file, what would stop the template being activated is listed under it on Details & documents, under Before the template can be activated:, tracked changes nobody has accepted or rejected among them.

If someone else saved the wording while you had it open, your save is refused: choose Download yours as Word (.docx) to keep your changes, or Open the saved version. Leaving the editor with changes not saved asks first. Preview PDF saves your changes, then shows the document as a PDF, with every clause in and the placeholders as typed.

Place fields, and activate it

1. Go to Place fields. A Word document’s fields are there already, from its tags: select one to change its settings, such as whether it must be filled in, or a drop-down’s options. To add or move a field, use Edit wording. A field whose box covers other words, with how to give it room, and an optional clause no wording has, are listed under Worth a look:.
2. Choose Save & activate. It’s refused, naming each problem, until the template has a document, someone who signs, a Signature or Approve / Decline field for each person who signs, its drop-downs’ options, and nothing left under Publishing will refuse. Once it’s active, anything still worth a look is said, such as a signer whose only signature is inside an optional clause, who would have nowhere to sign if it’s left out, or an optional clause no wording has.

Change the wording later

On the template’s Details & documents step, the Word document’s menu has Edit wording, Download Word (.docx), Download PDF preview, Go back to the uploaded file, which puts back the file as it was first uploaded, and Use as fixed PDF, which turns it into fixed pages for good and deletes its Word files. Use as fixed PDF is refused while the wording has optional clauses, or a drop-down from a tag has no options.

Saving new wording on an active template keeps it active, and a bulk send of it under way stops sending the rows still to go. If the wording now has a problem, Create envelope is refused until it’s fixed. Envelopes already made from the template don’t change. See Edit wording.

Make a template from a PDF

A PDF template keeps its pages as they are, on every plan: fields go on top, and each detail is written on the page where you typed its placeholder. The full rules are in Variables and How values fit in a PDF template.

Placeholders and fields

1. In the program you write the document in, type a placeholder where each detail goes, with no spaces inside the braces, such as {{{tenant_name}}}, then save it as a PDF. The placeholder has to be the PDF’s own text: a scanned page is only a picture of its words, and isn’t filled in.
2. Choose + New template, name it, choose Create & edit, and add the PDF on Details & documents.
3. On Recipients & variables, add the people who sign with + Add recipient slot. Then, for each placeholder, choose + Add variable under Template variables, type the placeholder’s name under Variable name (capitals don’t matter), choose its Type (Text, Rich text, Image or Table), and choose Save. A placeholder with no variable of its name stays on the page as typed, and nothing warns you.
4. On Place fields, choose whose fields you’re placing under Placing for, pick a field, and click the page where it goes. A PDF with form fields of its own can bring them in with Import form fields. Then choose Save & activate.

How values are filled in

• A text value is written where its placeholder was, in the same size, and the placeholder is taken out; text joined to it, such as a comma straight after it, is written with the value. Nothing after it on the line moves, so its room ends a space short of the next word on its line, or of a field placed on the line after it, or else at the right margin.
• A value too long for that is written smaller to fit, down to about 70% of the size. One that still doesn’t fit stops Create envelope (and that row of a bulk send) before anything is made, saying which value and what it runs into: see “too long for its place”. So give a placeholder for something that can be long, such as a name, an address or a fee, room after it on its line.
• Values print in a plain sans-serif font, in black, and in bold only if their line is bold.
• In a few PDFs, made by programs that write their text in the PDF format’s built-in fonts (most often bold or italic Times), placeholders are covered with white instead of taken out: they stay in the file’s text under the value, where copying or searching the text finds them, with no difference you can see or print.
• A PDF made on a Mac, in Pages, TextEdit or Preview, or printed to PDF from another Mac app, fills the same way, at the size its text is drawn.
• A placeholder on a page that’s rotated in the PDF can’t be filled: Create envelope says “Page 2 is rotated in the PDF, and a placeholder on a rotated page can’t be filled in.” Save the document as a PDF again without rotating its pages, and replace the template’s PDF. Rotating a page in the PDF editor rotates it in the PDF.
• Rarely, a PDF names a font without including it or saying how wide its letters are. As you add the PDF, a note under it says so, naming each placeholder in that font (the note isn’t shown again once you leave the page). Create envelope and bulk sends stop at any of them that has a variable, until you save the document as a PDF again (for example, print it to PDF) and replace the template’s PDF with that copy.
• Names in any language print as typed, apart from emoji and the scripts there’s no font for yet, such as Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic (Amharic), Myanmar (Burmese), Khmer, Lao and Tibetan: each of those characters prints as its code, such as [U+1F600].

Rich text, pictures and tables

Put a rich text, picture or table placeholder on a line by itself, with room under it. Rich text wraps between its placeholder and the right margin, down to the next line of text or field below it, or the bottom margin: one too long for that stops Create envelope, saying how many of its lines fit. A picture is never made bigger, and is at most 8.5 cm wide and a third of the page tall; nothing moves to make room for it. A table that doesn’t fit carries on over pages added at the end of the document, with its headings again, up to 2,000 rows and 100 added pages; one whose columns don’t fit across the page, or with a row taller than a page, stops Create envelope, saying why. Rich text and tables print only the letters of Western European languages: other letters are left out, without a warning. See How values fit in a PDF template.

Changing a template’s PDF

A template has no Replace file. To change its PDF, add the new one on Details & documents, choose Remove on the old one’s ⋮ menu, use Move up if the new one should come first, and place its fields again on Place fields. Its variables stay as they are.

Use a template

Fill in this send’s details

1. Open Templates, find it under Active, and choose Use template.
2. Under Details for this send, fill in each variable, named as the template names it. One marked with an asterisk must be filled in. Each optional clause is a switch, set to the template’s default: on, its wording is in the envelope; off, it’s left out, and clauses numbered by Word’s own numbering close up (numbers typed by hand don’t).
3. Under Recipients, give each person’s name and email, where the template hasn’t filled them in already, and a mobile for anyone the template sends a code to before they sign. For an optional slot, tick Leave this one out if you don’t need it. A nominated signer isn’t named here: the signer who nominates them names them when they sign.
4. Choose Create envelope. If something stops it, such as a value too long for its place, the dialog says what, and nothing is made. If a Word document still has the library’s drafting note or an [Optional: …] marker, a warning above the button says so.

Check it, and send it

The envelope opens in the send wizard on Place fields, with everything in place: check it, and send it as in Send your first document. On Solo and up, until it’s sent, a document from a Word template keeps its filled-in Word file, so Edit wording on its menu, on the wizard’s first step, fixes a typo in this envelope without changing the template. While a document still has the library’s drafting note, a warning beside Send envelope says to delete it in Edit wording first; it doesn’t stop you sending. Changing a template later doesn’t change envelopes already made from it.

On the Free plan, each envelope made from a template counts towards your 3 envelopes a month when it’s sent. See Use a template.

Send to a list of people (Team and Scale)

1. Beside an active template, choose Bulk send, then Download the spreadsheet. It has a name and email column for each person the template sends to (and a mobile column for anyone sent a code), and a column for each detail it fills in. A nominated signer has no columns: their nominator names them.
2. Fill in a row for each envelope, save it as CSV, and upload it, or copy the rows, header row included, and paste them. An optional person whose email is left blank is left out of that envelope. An optional clause is a column answered yes or no.
3. Choose Check the list. Every row is looked at before anything is sent, and a row with a problem says what. Fix it, or tick the box to leave out the rows with problems. Then choose the button that says how many, such as Send 12 envelopes, and confirm.

Team sends up to 25 rows a batch and Scale up to 250. Each envelope it makes is a signing session. If the template’s wording changes after a bulk send has started, the rows still to go aren’t sent: “The template’s wording changed after this bulk send started, so this row wasn’t sent. Start a new bulk send for the rows that are left.” See Bulk send.

From your own systems (Solo and up)

Through the API, POST /api/v1/envelopes/from-template makes an envelope from an active template, with its variables and who fills each role. An optional clause is a variable answered yes or no. See Send an envelope from a template.

Where the PDF editor fits in

On Solo and up, the PDF editor adds over a PDF’s pages: text, pictures and shapes on top, a cover over words you want gone, pages rotated or deleted, or a blank page. It can’t change a PDF’s own text as text, and a Word file dropped on it opens in the document editor instead. See The PDF editor.

• On a draft envelope, including one made from a template. Under Send & Sign, a draft’s document has Edit content on its menu. Save to document puts your changes back into the envelope, and each field moves with the words beside it; one whose words have gone stays where it was, listed under Check these fields. On a Word document, saving there turns it into a PDF for good, and Edit wording is no longer offered for it, so change the wording first.
• Covering words up. A White-out box, a filled rectangle, or a text or rich text box with a background covers what’s under it. The words under it are taken out of the file when you save, download, send for signing, or save into an envelope’s document. In a PDF under Saved PDFs, the box can still be moved or deleted, but the words it covered when you saved are gone from the file: moving it shows a blank space where they were. A PDF saved before saving took the words out still has them under its boxes, and says so when it’s opened: choose Save to take them out. Anything else on top, such as a filled ellipse or a picture, only hides the words on the page: they stay in the file, where copying or searching the text finds them. In a few PDFs the words can’t be taken out cleanly: nothing is saved, and the page says to save the document as a PDF again (for example, print it to PDF) and edit that copy; in a PDF under Saved PDFs, it says how to save your other changes instead. See Add to the page.
• Before a PDF becomes a template. To make a template from a PDF you’ve changed here, choose Download and add that copy to the template. What you added is baked in, and the words under a cover are taken out. Don’t rotate a page that has a placeholder: on a rotated page it can’t be filled.

What each plan includes

• On Free, Use template waits once the month’s 3 envelopes are sent, until the allowance starts again on the 1st (10 or 11 am Sydney time), unless the workspace has single envelopes to send on. It also waits while the workspace holds 3 unsent drafts.
• Moving to Free keeps every template, saved document and saved PDF. Templates can still be used, Word templates included, except one with a nominated signer; and an envelope for more than 10 people can’t be sent on Free. Editing a Word template’s wording, downloading its Word file, Go back to the uploaded file, Use as fixed PDF, and opening saved documents and PDFs to edit need Solo or above. See What moving to Free means.

Prices are on the pricing page.

Common questions and messages

What the app says, in its own words where they help, and what to do.

Document editor and Write a document show a padlock

They come with Solo and up. If you open one anyway, it says “The document editor is available on the Solo plan and up”. On Free, upload a finished Word or PDF file instead. A Word file is converted to a fixed PDF, and field tags typed in it stay on the page as typed, so place its fields by hand. The library says “Starting templates are on Solo and up.”

I can’t add another template

The Free plan includes 2 templates, archived ones included. Archiving one doesn’t make room; deleting one does. A draft or an archived template can be deleted under Templates; to delete an active one, archive it first. Solo and up have no limit.

Use template is locked

On Free, it waits once the month’s 3 envelopes are sent, until the 1st (10 or 11 am Sydney time), or while the workspace holds 3 unsent drafts. The line at the top of the Templates page says which. With the month’s 3 sent, buy a single envelope under Settings → Billing, or upgrade; with 3 drafts held, send or delete one.

Save & activate is refused

The refusal names each problem. “Every recipient needs at least one signature or approve/decline field. Missing for 1 recipient(s).” means someone who signs has no Signature or Approve / Decline field yet: place one, or, in a Word document, add a Signature tag for them with Signer field. A Word document’s problems are the ones listed under it on Details & documents, and in Edit wording after a save there: fix them in the wording, and give each drop-down from a tag its options on Place fields.

“names no signer”

“[[Signature:guarantor]] names no signer. Add a signer whose tag key is guarantor in step 2, or remove the tag.” means no one who signs has the tag key guarantor. Each person’s tag key is on their card on Recipients & variables. Change the tag to their key, or add a signer labelled “Guarantor”, whose key is then guarantor unless someone already has it.

A placeholder was left in the document as typed

In a PDF template, a placeholder is filled only when a variable has its name (capitals don’t matter), it has no spaces inside its braces, and it’s the PDF’s own text, not a scanned picture of it. Nothing warns you otherwise, so compare the names under Template variables with the document. A Word template says so when you save, and can’t be activated until they match.

“too long for its place”

In a PDF template, a value has the room from its placeholder to the next word on its line, a field placed on the line after it, or the right margin, and is written no smaller than about 70% of its size. The message says which, and what to do: shorten the value; or, when a field is in the way, “move the field further along the line” on Place fields; or change the document, leaving more room after the placeholder or putting it nearer the start of its line, then save it as a PDF again and replace the template’s PDF. A Word template has no such limit: its sentences make room.

“has nowhere to sign”

“The optional clause ‘guarantee’ is left out of this envelope, so Guarantor has nowhere to sign” means the only place that person signs is inside the clause you switched off. Switch the clause on, or change the template so they sign outside it too, for example with a Signature block after the clause.

“can’t yet put into a PDF made from a Word file”

A Word template can’t yet take a value in a script SignSwifly can’t draw from a Word file, such as Arabic, Devanagari or Thai. Create envelope stops, naming the value: “The value of ‘client_name’ has Arabic text, which SignSwifly can’t yet put into a PDF made from a Word file. Change the value, or use a template made from a PDF instead.” A PDF template prints such a name as typed.

A field covers some words

A field from a tag grows upwards from the tag’s line, so a tag on the line straight under a heading covers the heading. In Edit wording, do as the message says: leave an empty line or two above the tag, or put it at the end of its line or on a line of its own. Signature block leaves the right room.

My Word file became a fixed PDF

On Free, every Word file is converted to a fixed PDF. On Solo and up, the page says why when one is: it has text in a script SignSwifly can’t yet draw from a Word file, which it names (Arabic, Devanagari or Thai, say); it’s past the document editor’s limits; or it couldn’t be set up for editing. One past the limits can be made editable: do what the page says, such as using fewer pictures, then remove the fixed PDF and add the file again.

“a newer version was saved meanwhile”

In a template’s wording, “Not saved: a newer version was saved meanwhile” means someone saved it while you had it open, perhaps you in another tab, so yours wasn’t saved over it. Choose Download yours as Word (.docx) to keep your changes, or Open the saved version. A saved document says, for example, “Sam saved this document after you opened it, so yours hasn’t been saved over theirs.” and asks “Save yours as a new document now?”: choose OK to keep both.

“Take it out first?” when I save

Remove Content Control took an optional clause of whole paragraphs off the screen but not out of the document, so saved, its wording would still be optional. Choose Take it out and save: the clause goes from the wording, and its words stay, no longer optional. If that clause had been saved before, the page then asks Save without them?: choose Save anyway. If it can’t be taken out in the editor, the page says so: open the saved version, or download yours as Word and take it out in Word. If no wording uses the clause any more, the save then lists it under Worth a look:, so you can remove it in step 2.

A Word file with tracked changes

Accept or reject the tracked changes in Word, save the file, and use that copy. Adding one with tracked changes to an envelope is refused: “That Word document has tracked changes. Accept or reject them in Word, save it, and upload that.” So is adding one to a template on Free, or on Solo and up one that would be added as a fixed PDF. Otherwise, on Solo and up, a template takes the file, lists its tracked changes under Before the template can be activated:, and Save & activate refuses it (“Accept or reject the tracked changes first.”): remove that document and add the accepted copy. The document editor won’t open a file that has tracked changes.

“Your workspace’s Word templates use 1 GB”

Every Word document in the workspace’s templates, archived ones included, counts towards 1 GB: its Word file, its preview and the file first uploaded. Remove a document you no longer need, or choose Use as fixed PDF on one whose wording won’t change, which deletes its Word files; then save again.