Signers vs Recipients - docusignapi

Question

We are integrating our BPM application with Docusign. We have a document which should be signed by n individuals. Should we have multiple recipient tags or just 1 recipient tag with multiple signer tags inside that? What would be the difference between both the approaches?

Answer 1

Each Recipient object has properties that identify a specific signer including a property that represents the signer's name, for example). Your "Create Envelope" API request will need to include a separate Recipient object for each Signer -- and then, for each recipient, you'll specify tags that belong to the recipient. (The other approach you describe -- i.e., facilitating multiple people signing an envelope by specifying only one recipient with multiple 'sign here' tags -- is not feasible under any circumstances.)
For example, the recipients structure that represents two Signers, each having one place to sign and one text box to complete, would look something like this:
"recipients": {
"signers": [
{
"name": "John Doe",
"email": "johnsemail#outlook.com",
"recipientId": "1",
"routingOrder": "1",
"clientUserId": "123",
"tabs":{
"signHereTabs":[
{
"tabLabel":"BSign1",
"documentId": "1",
"pageNumber": "1",
"xPosition": "200",
"yPosition": "200"
}
],
"textTabs":[
{
"tabLabel":"BorrowerPhone",
"value":"717-717-7171",
"documentId": "1",
"pageNumber": "1",
"xPosition": "100",
"yPosition": "100"
}
]
}
},
{
"name": "Jane Doe",
"email": "janesemail#outlook.com",
"recipientId": "2",
"routingOrder": "2",
"clientUserId": "567",
"tabs":{
"signHereTabs":[
{
"tabLabel":"CBSign1",
"documentId": "1",
"pageNumber": "2",
"xPosition": "200",
"yPosition": "200"
}
],
"textTabs":[
{
"tabLabel":"Co-BorrowerPhone",
"value":"111-222-3333",
"documentId": "1",
"pageNumber": "2",
"xPosition": "100",
"yPosition": "100"
}
]
}
}
]
}
Taking some time to review the information (and code samples) on the DocuSign Developer Center (https://www.docusign.com/developer-center) and within the REST API Guide (https://10226ec94e53f4ca538f-0035e62ac0d194a46695a3b225d72cc8.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/rest-api-guide-v2.pdf) would be time well spent.