Recipients are forced to drag & drop placeholders even though the PDF envelope contains all the docusign api tags

​@neel_patel_73 

I think there are a couple things that you mention here:

1. The screenshot you provided shows the “freeform signing” experience, which is when you click “Sign a Document” instead of “Send an Envelope” from the UI. This free option only support basic features and does not support the “AutoPlace” functionality or other more advanced features.
2. Similarly, when the “create envelope” API call does not find any “AutoPlace Text” it will not add any fields to the document and if your account allows “freeform signing” the recipient will get the envelope and needs to manually drag the fields as shown in your screenshot.
3. When you create an envelope via API and specify the fields with “AutoPlace” in the payload correctly, it will automatically apply them. The same will happen when there are “Document Custom Fields” defined with “AutoPlace Text”. These fields need to be shared with the user in order to automatically position them on the document, maybe you have not created or share them in your production account as in the developer account? This would be the most common issue, why fields are not automatically applied in this scenario.

​@Michael.Rave - Thanks for getting back!

I have docusign integrated and it allows the users to send docusign documents to the recipients by email. 

I use anchorString properties (e.g., /DS-sig-/) to position them on the document. It works correctly for almost all the users except for a few and it also works in dev docusign account. I don’t know what’s the exact issue here but It works correctly for most for of the users using the app. 

​@neel_patel_73 

It sounds like those document custom fields have been shared, unless all those users, where it successfully works have DS Admin permissions? In that case it will work for them without setting up sharing correctly, as they have access.

This is a screenshot from the Admin - Document Custom Fields. The icon with the people indicate it is shared:

Do you use/apply a template, which contains the fields with the anchorStrings? In that case it maybe similar that the required template is not shared with those users encountering the issue? DS Admin always have access to all templates and this sounds like an issue related to missing access rights, which causes the fields not to be present on the document, if those documents contain the right placeholders as you stated previously.

There are no custom fields, we let the user create a template, we then transform that template to a pdf file that contains docusign tags and then it’s sent to the recipients. 

​@Michael.Rave ??

​@neel_patel_73 

If there are no document custom fields defined, all anchorText strings need to be in the API payload and those anchorText strings need to be present when the envelope is created via API.

​@Michael.Rave - Yes, this is being done in the code, I checked multiple times. That’s the reason why I’m not able to find the cause here. The tags are being sent in via api when the envelope is created. This works correctly for all the orgs except a few in prod and this works correctly all the time in dev environment. Is there a setting in prod that could be causing this or anything related to this?

​@neel_patel_73

What exactly do you mean by orgs? Different Docusign accounts that potentially have different Docusign plans?

I assume you checked the PDF documents for the text being present on the document and matches correctly?

I am not aware of any account setting related to this.

Whenever I’ve seen this, it was because I sent the document to a recipient with a defined role (say CoSigner) but the template didn’t have any fields defined for the CoSigner to complete.  When the CoSigner goes online to review the document, DocuSign seems to throw him/her into “Design Mode” and makes them have to drag/drop fields onto the document in order to complete signing.

Hope this helps.