Resources

Understanding E-Signatures: A Beginner’s Guide

Electronic signatures have seen significant adoption in the past decade within insurance, lending, government and other industries. Replacing manual, paper-based processing with automated, electronic signing processes has enabled organizations large and small to significantly reduce the cycle times, errors and costs associated with getting customers, partners, supplier and employees to review and sign documents needed to close new business, authorize decisions, and move operations forward.

Indeed, the impact electronic signatures have on an organization’s ability to deliver superior customer service, increase operational efficiency and improve bottom line results has often far exceeded initial expectations.

This beginner’s guide introduces business and IT executives to the key concepts and considerations for moving to paperless, signing processes, including:

Technology / Terminology: How solutions have evolved over the years to handle greater levels of complexity and automation, and what technologies they use at their foundation.
Compliance & Legality: How electronic signatures can help organizations to strengthen their legal and compliance position by capturing more comprehensive evidence than is possible with pen and paper.
Security: The three levels of security that need to be addressed in order to effectively mitigate risk: 1) user security, 2) document security, and 3) process security.
User Adoption: How to make the e-signing process easier than pen and paper, including the three requirements for ensuring that users adopt a solution.
E-Signing Process: What options are available for designing an electronic signing process that supports a variety of business requirements and environments.
Solution Options: A review of the three key solution options: 1) on-premises solution, 2) dedicated cloud service (SaaS), and 3) shared cloud service (multi-tenant SaaS).