Collect documents from clients, without the email chain.
Most document collection fails the same way: a request goes out by email, replies arrive in pieces, and someone spends the week working out what is still missing. Here is how to run it so that nothing gets lost.
Why email breaks down
Email is a poor place to run a checklist. Attachments arrive under different subjects, one person answers and the other does not, and the only record of what is outstanding is a person's memory. On a file with several parties, a single matter can turn into a dozen threads.
The deeper problem is privacy. When everyone is copied on everything, a co-applicant sees the applicant's bank statement, and the witness sees both.
A better way to run a collection
- One file for the matter, not one document per person. Everything that follows hangs off it.
- One list per person: the documents they upload, the forms they complete and the facts they confirm. Each person sees only their own list.
- One link per person, in the order you set, so the sequence you chose is the sequence that happens.
- Review in one place. Approve each item, or send one back with a reason so that only that item reopens.
- Close the file when it is complete, so the finished record is kept with the client.
Send back one item, not the whole file
When a document is unreadable or the wrong one, the person should fix that one thing and nothing else. If the request is reopened as a whole, people start again and the file drifts. Reopening only the item that failed, with the reason attached, keeps everything the person already gave you exactly where it is.
Before you send a request
- List each party and what you need from each of them, separately.
- Decide the order: who goes first and who must wait.
- Decide which documents need proof of identity before they are accepted.
- Decide who reviews what, and what happens when something comes back wrong.
How Trust Ledger does it
Trust Ledger is built around exactly this: a request for the matter, a checklist and a link for each person, per-party privacy enforced in the data rather than by asking people to be careful, and a review screen where everything comes back together. The how it works page shows the six steps, and the film follows one file from start to finish.