Hey!
I am a Software Engineer (Mobile, Android). I applied for Stage 1 (Exceptional Promise) on the 2nd of August on the Tech Nation website form. I applied with MC, OC2 and OC3. I got rejected for all the criteria on 13th of August. There were many reasons but they didn’t mention my recommendation letters at all in my proforma (they just briefly mentioned they are “respectable”). I appealed on 16th of August and got another rejection on 22nd of August. At that time they approved my OC2, but still rejected MC and OC3. At that time their review mentioned “Some are missing digital signature audit trails”. Did anyone get such feedback lately? I have 3 LORs and 3 Akc letter. All of them are signed manually on the paper and scanned. All of the letters has a footer with Name, Email, Phone, Address and Linkedin link. One of the LOR’s person doesn’t have a Linkedin that’s why I attached his CV on the last page of the letter (my lawyers say it’s acceptable).
I am planning to re-apply after gathering my evidence better. I apply with the help of lawyers and they say they don’t know yet what this comment about digital signature mean. Some of their clients are getting it recently. It can be possibly connected to the fact that one of my recommenders doesn’t have a inkedin, but my lawyers say their clients got the same review comment even when all of the recommenders had linkedin.
Mb someone got the same comment lately? I wonder if I shoud ask all of my r4ecommenders sign with DocuSign or somthing similar, but it still can have issues since with DocuSign it’s too obvious you personally send this to someone to sign, and it should look like they write the letter and sign it voluntarily
Hi @ndronina42 sorry about the outcome! It’s disappointing to receive a rejection especially when this application demands so much effort. You can consider Docusign! The content you described for a recommender looks fine though, can comment better only after seeing the actual application.
If you are already engaging professional services with lawyers, feel free to DM if you want to consider a consultant. Lawyers are usually less preferred for this application for their lack of understanding and positioning wrt tech that’s required in this application.
It appears the application process is becoming stricter, so a trackable signature with perhaps audit trails, authentication is becoming suitable because in some ways electronic signatures are verifiable.
Docusign meets this standard.
That is not to say manual signature may not suffice, it all depends on perception of an application. But then digital signature may soon be the norm.
It sounds like they’re looking for Docusign signed letters. That’s where digital signature audit trails are relevant. Take a look - Docusign Support Center
Yes, but my lawyers say manual signature is preferred, since they had clients who got rejections because on the audit trail. It looked like the applicant sent the documents to the recommenders and they signed. But it should look like the recommenders just composed the letters themselves and then signed themselves. So the applicant email should not appear on the trail. And it’s not what Docusign was made for. So if you are using Docusign you should do the dirty trick: ask each recommender to register there, upload their letter, enter their own email, sent it for signature, get the letter from the email and sign. This is the only way. And for each registration you pay.
It’s really difficult to ask 3 C-level busy professionals to register somewhere, spend time on it, pay, upload your documents. It’s easier for them to just print, sign and scan
And in the technation guide they say letters are supposed to be signed and you can use digital signature. But you are not obliged to. That’s why manual signature is fairer and better