How to request a signature by email

Attaching a PDF and asking someone to sign and return it puts the entire burden on the recipient: find a printer, sign, find a scanner or use a phone camera app, and email a file back that is often blurry, rotated, or missing a page. A meaningful number of these never come back at all — not from refusal, but from friction.

It also gives you nothing to point to later. If a signature is disputed, an emailed scan proves only that a scan exists in your inbox, not who signed it, when, or whether the document was altered after the scan was made. See what happens when an electronic signature is disputed?

• A subject line that says what it is — "Signature needed: [Document name]" beats a vague "Following up".
• One clear action. A signing link that opens directly to the fields they need to complete, not an attachment plus instructions on what to do with it.
• A deadline. People sign faster when they know a link expires.
• Nothing to install. No account creation, no app download, no plugin.

A proper e-signature tool builds all four into the email it sends for you, so the request itself does the convincing.

1. 01Upload the PDF and place the fields the recipient needs to complete (signature, date, initials, and so on).
2. 02Enter their name and email, then send. One credit is debited — nothing is charged until you actually send.
3. 03Signavos emails them a secure, encrypted signing link. It opens directly to the document; there is nothing to download and nothing to print.
4. 04You get a notification the moment they sign, decline, or if the request expires unsigned.

The signing link stays valid for 30 days, but the request itself expires after 7 days if nobody signs. When it expires, the expiry is written to the audit trail and your credit is refunded automatically — you are never charged for a request nobody acted on.

If you need to remind someone, resend the invitation from the document page rather than starting a new email thread — it keeps everything, including the reminder, attached to the same audit record.

The Signavos web app sends to one recipient per document today. If two people need to sign — for example both tenants on a lease — send the document twice, once to each, which costs two credits. See how to send a lease for electronic signature for how that plays out in practice. If your workflow needs several signers on one envelope automatically, that is a case where a subscription tool with multi-signer support, like the ones on the comparison pages, is the better fit.

With Signavos you can request a signature by email without a subscription: upload the PDF, add the signer's email and pay per signature.