Overview
Three step types move a document between you and a user. Picking the wrong one costs you either a chase or a filing job, and the choice is easier than it looks.
This article is for administrators building an onboarding sequence that needs paperwork.
1. What is the question that sorts them?
Whether you only need to collect, or you need to supply and collect.
- Collect. You need a document from them that already exists. A certificate, a police check, proof of address, a driving licence.
- Supply and collect. You have to give them a document first and get a completed version back. A waiver, a contract, a medical form, a code of conduct that needs signing.
Answer that and the step type follows.
2. Collect only: the File upload step
They upload a file, and the step completes itself the moment it arrives.
This is the right tool when the document already exists and you just need a copy. There is nothing for you to prepare, and nothing for them to fill in.
The trade is that you get whatever they send. A clear scan, a photo of a page on a kitchen table, a PDF, an image. If the format matters to you, say so in the step description, because the step itself will not enforce it.
3. Supply and collect, option one: a two-way file upload
Set up as a Custom step: you attach the document you want them to have, they download it, complete it away from Vome, and upload it back.
It works, and it is familiar to anyone who has done paperwork by email. But it carries the whole round trip with it:
- They need to be able to open, and often print, your file
- You get back whatever they produce, which may be a photograph of a signed page
- Required fields are not required, so half-completed documents come back
- Every returned document is checked by you, by eye
4. Supply and collect, option two: the Fillable PDF step
You upload your real document, mark up the fields on it, and the person completes and signs it in the browser. Their signed copy comes back to you.
For anything that has to be signed, this is the better instrument, and it is better on four counts:
- Required fields are actually required. They cannot return it half-finished.
- The signature is captured in the document, not photographed next to it.
- No download, print, scan round trip, so it works on a phone, which is where a lot of people will do this.
- The step carries its own status, moving from Pending to Signed to Complete, so a document can be verified before it counts.
The one cost is up front: you have to mark up the fields once. You do that once per document, not once per person.
5. So which should I choose?
- They already have the document, you just need a copy: File upload.
- You supply a document that has to be signed: Fillable PDF.
- You supply a document that genuinely cannot be turned into fields, such as something they must take to a third party and have stamped: two-way file upload.
In practice the third case is rarer than people expect. If you are reaching for a two-way upload for a waiver or a consent form, reach for the fillable PDF instead.
6. What if I need several documents?
Use several steps, one document each.
It is tempting to bundle everything into one step to keep the sequence short, but a single step is a single status. Split them and each document is tracked, chased and verified on its own, which is what you will want the first time somebody sends four of five things.
Summary
- Ask whether you only collect, or supply and collect. Everything follows from that.
- File upload is collect only, and completes itself when the file arrives.
- A two-way file upload, built as a Custom step, supplies and collects but carries the full download and rescan round trip.
- Fillable PDF also supplies and collects, and is better for anything signed: required fields, a real signature, no printing, and its own Pending to Signed to Complete status.
- Reserve the two-way upload for documents that genuinely cannot become fields.
- One document per step, so each is tracked separately.
Where to go next