Signature Folder

The classic way to collect a signature goes like this: email the PDF, the other side prints it, signs it, photographs it at an angle with their phone, sends back an 8 MB JPEG, you print that and file it. Two printers, three days, zero traceability. The Signaturmappe replaces this paper detour with a link.

The flow is deliberately simple. You pick a PDF from your Aktenschrank - the contract, the quote, the agreement - and add up to 10 signers. They can sign in parallel or in a fixed order, if the managing director has to go before the customer. Every signer gets a personal link, delivered by email and also copyable, in case you would rather pass it on yourself via messenger.

Whoever opens the link sees the document in the browser and signs right there: draw with finger or mouse, or type their name. No account, no app install, no "please register first". This is the point where other providers kidnap your contract partners into their own signup funnel - here, people just sign.

Once everyone has signed, the Signaturmappe assembles the final PDF: your document plus an attached signature protocol with name, email address, timestamp, IP address and the document hash proving nobody tampered with the content afterwards. The result lands in your Aktenschrank automatically. Along the way an event log keeps the books: sent, opened, signed. You can send reminders, cancel the process and set link validity between 1 and 90 days.

Now the part the big e-signature vendors like to hide in the fine print: legally, this is a simple electronic signature in text form per § 126b BGB, backed by the audit trail. For the vast majority of everyday business contracts - quotes, service agreements, NDAs, freelancer contracts, rental handovers - that is entirely sufficient, because these contracts do not require statutory written form in the first place. In a dispute, the protocol is subject to the court's free assessment of evidence, and a protocol with timestamp, IP and document hash is considerably more than a crooked phone photo.

What the Signaturmappe is NOT: a qualified electronic signature under eIDAS. That requires certified trust service providers and identity verification. Where the law demands written form - for instance terminating an employment contract under § 623 BGB, guarantees, or fixed-term employment contracts - the Signaturmappe is not enough. We tell you this before you collect signatures, not after. A tool that sells you anything else here is selling you a problem.

For everything else: requesting a signature should be as easy as sending an email. Pick the PDF, add the signers, send it off, get it back signed in your Aktenschrank. No printer, no US cloud, and your contract partners never have to open an account with anyone.