You may be thinking to yourself – how much can it cost me to put my own signature on a document? After all, it is literally a few seconds! Why should I test a new solution that will bring my company additional costs? Will an electronic signature work for my company? Will implementing a platform for electronic document signing pay off for me?

Even if you are not yet convinced, we guarantee – implementing an electronic signature can bring your company significant savings! How? Read on – we’ll explain everything in a moment.

Let’s start with traditional document signing. Of course – just to make a manual signature is a few seconds, but after all, that’s not all! Let’s trace the path of a standard business contract to be signed by contractors.

Once the content of the agreement is prepared, it needs to be printed. How much can a few or a dozen sheets of paper covered with ink cost? Probably not much – but add to that the cost of servicing the printer (after all, someone has to make sure it runs smoothly, and fix the malfunction if it breaks down) and the amount you have to pay an employee for time spent printing and scanning. Companies also often choose to rent a printer. This solution is convenient, because it is the company that rents the equipment that takes care of supplying toners and maintaining the equipment, but unfortunately it also costs money.

Average cost of servicing a printer: about PLN 150 – 200 per month

Average cost of paper: PLN 2.40 per contract

The cost of renting a printer (with servicing and toner): about PLN 500 per month

Once the document is printed, the contract must be signed. First the document goes to the directors and then to the CEO, who, with a bit of luck, may happen to be at the company’s headquarters, but may also be in a meeting, working from home or be at the airport. Here, theoretically, the cost is small, but imagine that the contract is dozens of pages long, and the CEO has to put his initials on each of them. How much of his valuable time will it take?

The cost of time spent signing the contract: PLN 40 for 0.5 h of work

If only one person from the company signs the document and he is currently at the company’s headquarters, the contract can be forwarded to the contractor. However, such situations in times of pandemonium are extremely rare – we are increasingly abandoning office work in favor of a safer option, namely home office work. If the CEO is out of the office or several board members should sign, and each of them is in a different location, the envelope with the document must circulate between them until all signatures are collected on paper.

Later, the contract goes on its way to the contractor – if everything agrees in the content, the document is signed and returns to the company’s headquarters

Such documents are usually sent by courier or, if everything happens within one city, a representative of the company drives a cab and collects the necessary signatures. How much will such a process cost your company?

Courier shipment: about 18-28 zlotys for one course to one person (and such courier shipments usually need to be ordered much more)

Cab: 30-60 PLN for one course to one person.

Okay, so how much does it all cost you then? After adding up the above figures, we get the following amounts:

131, 40 PLN – the measurable cost of reprocessing one contract

PLN 13,100 – the measurable cost of reprocessing 100 contracts

On top of that, you still have to add the amount you have to pay an employee for the time spent on printing and scanning, coordinating and arranging courier delivery. In the case of 100 contracts, you will have to pay about PLN 8,000 for this work. If, instead of a courier, the transportation of the contracts will be handled by an employee, transporting the documents by cab, for his work (with 100 contracts per year), you will have to pay a total of PLN 32,000.

Let’s also remember that not everything always goes smoothly. Not always the contractor will accept the content of the contract, sometimes during the process there are errors that need to be corrected. The new version again has to go through the same path, which further multiplies the already considerable costs.

What will the costs look like if you decide to implement an electronic signature? As part of the DocuSign® electronic signature platform, one envelope (that is, a document submitted for signature), will cost you about PLN 12-19. Always – without any unexpected costs.

If you also want to use a qualified signature as part of the platform, it will cost you an additional 1-2 PLN per month (a qualified signature costs about 300 PLN per year). Within this fee you can sign an unlimited number of documents.

If your company buys a license, each contractor will be able to sign contracts prepared by you completely free of charge. DocuSign® thus saves time and money not only for you, but also for your business partners. This is a tool that will effectively replace tedious printing of papers – everything will be done electronically.

You yourself know how time-consuming it is to prepare complex and extensive documents in teams, when each revised version is sent by e-mail to the entire team. This creates a dozen or even dozens of versions of the same document – theoretically numbered consecutively, but in practice it is often difficult to find out which is the most up-to-date one. Every hour spent on downloading, attaching, numbering, sending and coordinating the whole process is money that could be spent on something more useful, such as training to develop employee competence.

All right, but how then to save that money? There is a simple solution – consider implementing the Hatiroo™ electronic workflow system. This system, which is fully integrated with the DocuSign® platform, will allow you to streamline not only signing, but also creating, reviewing and archiving company documents

Hatiroo™ enables efficient processing of contracts, work (including simultaneous) of all team members on one document, automatic archiving of contracts and full control over all data.

How much does it cost? Electronic document workflow works and pays off when processing min. 10 contracts per month. However, we assume that your company processes many more.

With 100 contracts per month, you will pay about PLN 28 for one document created, reviewed and archived fully electronically. In the process, you will save time and money and make your company more environmentally friendly. If you want to learn more, read the article Does implementing an electronic document workflow pay off?

Have you been signing documents traditionally for years and are afraid of change? Remember that even what has worked forever can be turned into something better! A thriving business means constant change and continuous improvement. Don’t let your company stand still and take a step towards easier, more efficient and more effective work for your entire team.