Everything you should know about suggestions in Contractbook

This article describes how to use data fields across your documents. It contains the following topics:

• Suggestions document usage
• Creating a new suggestion
• Tagging others in suggestions
• Reviewing all added suggestions
• Public suggestions visibility rules
• Private suggestions visibility rules
• Commenting on suggestions
• Approving and rejecting suggestions
• Approved and rejected suggestions visibility
• Checking the status of suggestions
• Approved suggestions in the document history
• Deleting created suggestions
• Editing made suggestions
• Resolving made suggestions
• Deleting document content with suggestions
• Suggesting edits for data fields
• Notifying others about suggestions
• Signing a draft with unresolved suggestions

The recipients of your contract drafts can now add actionable suggestions directly to the document (also known as redlining). No more switching between tools to discuss changes and make amendments to your drafts. You will have everything in one place for complete redlining functionality.

Where can I use suggestions?

Suggestions are available in draft documents in Contractbook. 

How can I create a new suggestion?

• Open the draft contract (you can add a new suggestion both in Create and Preview modes of the draft)
• Highlight the text you would like to amend and click "Suggest change"

• Type in your suggested amendment.
• Choose whether your suggestion should be private or public from the dropdown list.
• Click the blue button to submit your suggestion.
• The draft owner or manager will be notified that a new suggestion has been submitted.

Can I tag collaborators in my suggestions?

You can! Mention your draft collaborators in the text field, and they will receive a notification via email. 

For collaborators who do not already have access to the draft, you will be prompted to share the draft with them.

Where can I find all created suggestions in a draft?

In the comments and suggestions section of the documents sidebar, you will find a list of all suggestions and their details.

• All suggestions can be filtered based on their status: active and resolved
• You will also be able to see the type of suggestion, whether private or public, if you have the necessary permissions

Who can make or see public suggestions in drafts? 

Unlike private suggestions, public suggestions are visible to anyone with access to the draft. Regardless of the type of access they have, they can see existing public suggestions and create new public suggestions.

Document owners and managers can differentiate public suggestions from private suggestions as they do not contain a status in the sidebar:

Who can make or see private suggestions in drafts?

Creating new and viewing existing private suggestions is only available to collaborators who have been granted access to private comments and suggestions. This access can be enabled when sharing a draft and assigning individual permissions.

The toggle labeled "Can access private comments and private suggestions" must be on.

The suggestions status tooltip will remind you of the visibility of private suggestions.

Can I comment on an existing suggestion?

Absolutely! Once a suggestion is created, you can add comments using the text field and mention other collaborators with access to the draft:

Who can approve or reject a suggestion?

Only collaborators with the following permissions can approve or reject a suggestion: 

• Owner of the draft
• Manager of the draft (Collaborators with full access permission)
• Editor of the draft (Collaborators with edit permission)

Who can see approved or rejected suggestions? 

• An approved or rejected private suggestion is visible to collaborators with "access to private comments & suggestions":

• An approved or rejected public suggestion is visible to anyone who has access to the draft, regardless of the type of access they have.

How can I see if a suggestion was approved or rejected?

You can view if a suggestion was approved or rejected by clicking on the suggestion from the comments sidebar.

How does an accepted suggestion appear in the document's version history? 

• An accepted suggestion looks like any other edit made when being reviewed in the document's version history
• It will be listed as edited by the person who approved it, not the creator of the suggestion.

How do I pull a suggestion back?

You can only delete a suggestion before it is approved or rejected. This means that the suggestion must still be active.

Once a suggestion is approved or rejected, it will no longer be possible to delete it.

Can I edit a suggestion?

If you need to make changes to a suggestion after creating it, you need to delete it first and then add a new suggestion by highlighting the exact text in the body of the draft.

It is not possible to edit resolved suggestions.

How can I resolve a suggestion?

Select the suggestion from the sidebar and click the checkmark in the pop-up window to accept it:

The suggestion will be marked as accepted and moved to the resolved section in the sidebar:

The amendments from the suggestion will be automatically applied to the body of the draft, and the details will only be visible in the comments & suggestions sidebar.

What happens if text highlighted with a suggestion is deleted from the body of the draft?

We do not recommend editing the contents of the draft body before all available suggestions are resolved first.

Nevertheless, if this happens and a collaborator with editing permissions deletes content containing a suggestion, it will be available in the document as a reference without being linked to specific text in the body of the draft.

You can access these suggestions from the sidebar, and the only action you can perform is to delete or reject them:

Can recipients suggest edits for data fields?

It is not yet possible to create suggestions for an area of text that contains a data field. Instead, collaborators can add private or public comments to data fields.

Who is notified of the suggestions activity?

• The owner (creator) of the draft, plus any collaborators with full access and editing permissions, will be notified once a suggestion is created.
• Collaborators who created a suggestion, have commented on a suggestion, or were tagged in a suggestion will receive a notification on new comments, approvals, and rejections.

Is it possible to receive bulk email notifications?

Currently, we do not support bulk email notifications.

Can I sign a draft with unresolved suggestions?

It is not possible to sign a draft with active suggestions. Active suggestions need to be resolved first to proceed with signing the draft:

When the document owner or any collaborator with full access rights attempts to send the draft for signature, they can reject all active suggestions at once in bulk.

When multiple suggestions in a draft are rejected, there will not be a corresponding email notification for the bulk rejected suggestions.

Note: If the text linked to an active suggestion in the document's body were deleted, you would still need to reject the suggestion to sign or send the draft for signatures.

If you still need additional information or assistance, reach out to us at any time by contacting our Support Team.