New Age of Digital Signing is Here

New Age of Digital Signing is Here

ADLS introduces new digital signing features to its renowned WebForms platform – New Zealand's most trusted legal forms & precedents

Auckland, 27 November 2017 – ADLS (Auckland District Law Society) announces the introduction of digital signing to its well-known WebForms platform which offers online document creation for many of the most widely used legal forms in New Zealand. These include the familiar Agreement for Sale and Purchase of Real Estate form and the Commercial Deed of Lease form.

The trusted authority in online legal document creation, ADLS’ WebForms are used by over 1000 law firms, enabling thousands of legal professionals across the country to customise legal forms using more than 100 templates. ADLS has now extended their expertise and experience in online documents to digital signing.

ADLS has invested in digital signing as part of its role in leading the legal profession and ensuring practitioners are well-equipped with the tools they need to best serve their clients.

The WebForms platform offers distinctive and customised workflows designed with lawyers and their clients in mind. However, the technology that underpins it may be applicable to other sectors looking for a secure and robust solution.

Key features

In applying digital signing to WebForms, ADLS has launched a customised product. Key features include:

Options for real-time, online verification of identity, using Real Me, NZ Passport and NZ Drivers licence

A signing log which captures all signing interactions, and provides an audit trail of the signing process

PKI digital certificate technology that seals the document and its signatures

Ability to digitally witness a signature

The ability to upload non-ADLS documents into WebForms to be digitally signed.

Additional features like the ability to digitally negotiate and countersign a document will also be added.

Leveraging the authority of ADLS’ membership – including a specially appointed steering group of six ADLS Law Committee Members – and its standing in the legal community, this digital signing service via WebForms includes robust security features.

Tim Jones, former convener of ADLS’ Documents & Precedents Committee, says having the right checks and balances in place makes this platform the pre-eminent version in the market.

“It needed an organisation like ADLS to enable digital signing of legal forms, so that people can be confident using it and now it’s here. Because ADLS has done so much work on this, lawyers and their clients can be confident it’s a secure product.”

How clients will benefit

ADLS’ digital signing feature is a significant step forward in applying cutting-edge technology to legal practice, and will bring a new level of efficiency to the relationship between lawyers and their clients.

Joanna Pidgeon, President of ADLS, says the introduction of digital signing will transform how lawyers, clients and their businesses work together.

“As a practising lawyer I know meeting clients face-to-face will always be important. But, as people’s lives become busier and traffic gets heavier, digital signing will mean increasing efficiency for the document signing process, more convenience and also cost effectiveness.

“Documents no longer have to be couriered across town or to different parts of the country for signing – it can be done anywhere, at any time, on any internet-connected device including mobile. Not only does this speed-up the process, importantly, it provides a practical solution.”

Using the right partner

ADLS partnered with Secured Signing in launching the new service in WebForms. The Kiwi operated cloud-based digital signing provider delivered many of the standout features of the service.

Learning to use digital signing

A comprehensive education programme including an on-demand video, online User Guide, a Practice Notes and Protocols document, and one-on-one demonstrations to law firms is planned to educate users on how best to use digital signing on WebForms.

ENDS

About ADLS

ADLS is an independent membership organisation representing the New Zealand legal profession. It is renowned for its programmes for fostering collegiality, thought leadership and professional development, for the advancement of the profession.

http://www.adls.org.nz

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