PortiQ Frequently Asked Questions

To sign electronically with PortiQ Start, you need a PortiQ Start user account and a quota. A limited quota is included with the purchase of each user account.

No, you can also send signature requests to persons without a PortiQ Start account. They receive an email with a link to the document to be signed. Qualified signatures and identifications are deducted from the workflow starter’s quota.

PortiQ Start has three user types: the basic user, the extended user, and the tenant admin.

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A basic user can perform simple signatures, verify signatures, request signatures from persons with and without a PortiQ Start user account, create workflows, and create templates.

An extended user can perform simple, advanced, and qualified signatures, verify signatures, request signatures from persons with and without a PortiQ Start user account, create workflows, and create templates.

A tenant admin can do everything an extended user can. Additionally, a tenant admin can manage users in their tenant.

You can perform a simple electronic signature with any user type. For advanced and qualified signatures, you need an extended user or tenant admin.

With a basic user, you can request a qualified signature from an extended user. However, a basic user cannot request a qualified signature from basic users or external users.

A basic user cannot perform qualified signatures, therefore you cannot request a QES from a basic user. However, you can request a QES from that person by treating them as an external user.

External users, also referred to as external email addresses, are persons who do not have a PortiQ Start account.

External users do not have direct access to PortiQ Start but can only use a link to perform the requested action on the document. External users have no quota. Therefore, signatures and identifications performed by an external user are deducted from the workflow starter’s quota.

When you send a signature request for a qualified signature to an external user, that person is redirected to sign-me. There they can either log in with an existing sign-me account or register and identify themselves with sign-me. The identification is deducted from your quota.

Quotas determine how many signatures and identifications you may perform and how many 2-factor authentications via SMS OTP you can use. Each user type comes with a certain quota. Additional quotas can be purchased as add-on packages.

Quotas are consumed when you sign electronically, identify yourself with sign-me, or request an SMS OTP authentication from external persons. Your quota is also consumed when you request a signature from an external user (i.e. a person without a PortiQ Start user account) and that person signs or identifies themselves with sign-me for the signature.

When you send a signature request to another PortiQ Start user, the signature is deducted from the signer’s quota. When you send a signature request to an external email address, the signature as well as any identification for a qualified signature is deducted from your quota.

Ja, Sie können Ihr Kontingent mit anderen Benutzern teilen. Gehen Sie dazu in PortiQ start einfach unter „Verwalte Signaturkontingent“ auf „Kontingent mit anderen Nutzern teilen“.

No, the QES only expire after one year. Additionally, a user who purchases an account for one year receives all 60 QES at the beginning of the year.

Your managed signature quota belongs to your account, while the active quota is the quota you are currently using. The active quota may differ from the managed quota if you are sharing another user’s quota.

Add-on Packages ermöglichen Ihnen mehr qualifizierte Signaturen, Identifizierungen und SMS-Authentifizierungen durchzuführen als mit dem bei den Benutzertypen enthaltenen Standardkontingent.

No, performing a qualified signature with a basic user is not possible.

Only if the session in which they authenticated has expired. This means if the external user opens the download in the same browser in which they authenticated and the browser has not been closed, the server has not been restarted, and no new session has been created (e.g. through login).

Yes, different signature levels can be used in one document. However, a simple signature destroys previously existing cryptographic signatures in the document. Therefore, simple signatures should only be performed before advanced and qualified signatures and not the other way around.

Yes, other file formats can also be signed. For these, the result of the signature is the original file and a signature file (e.g. CAdES). If the signature should be part of the file, the file must be converted to PDF before signing.

Yes, by default we assume a maximum file size of 15MB. However, if you wish to sign larger files, please feel free to contact us.

Yes, all advanced and qualified remote signatures created with PortiQ are LTV-capable as they contain a timestamp. Documents created with PortiQ Start without an advanced or qualified signature are also sealed with an advanced platform seal and are therefore LTV-capable.

You receive a tenant when you acquire at least one tenant admin. A tenant is a customizable area of PortiQ Start managed by the tenant administrator. In the tenant, you can manage your users, configure your signature annotation, and share your entire quota with all your users, among other things.

This message means that your quota of qualified signatures (QES) is exhausted. To perform further qualified signatures, you need to purchase an add-on package.

If you want to test signing as an external user yourself, you must log out of PortiQ Start before clicking the link in the email to the external user.