Electronic signitures

Date 03-12-2013 05:11

I am just getting on board with qualifing welders with a new company I work for the last month. My question is this. I myself or others in the office might AWS stamp and sign fifty or more documents aday. That being said. The way we are doing it is we qualifiy the welder and type up the paperwork and then print it off. Then sign it off and stamp it and then scan it in PDF and send it off to the contractor and gas company in a PDF. Which is fine. But What I have noticed is when we first start with a new company is there are mulitple changes and that can lead to 5 to 6 hours worth of paper work and multiple reprints because the logo was not right or the welder quals had a digit missing out of his addresse. I could save alot of time and money if had my cwi stamp electronicly on file and a signiture. Then I could change any change and paste my info on there and never print a document and send a locked document.

BUT here are the two things I am struggling with. Is it ethical to digitally copy your stamp? Or your Signiture?

By 46.00

Date 03-12-2013 06:10

An interesting question! I have digitalised my signature before. But never my stamp! You signature is yours to do as you see fit with but the stamp would have copyright issues, I'm guessing?
It would also allow the potential for misuse.

By eekpod

Date 03-12-2013 10:19

Personally if it saved me that amount of time I would go for it and do whatever I had to to get it done, but I would somehow make sure NO ONE else could somehow remove it, copy it or use it.
That is one of my concerns is others trying to cut and paste it for thier own use without my knowledge, which is why when I stamp a document I always try to have a line or text under my CWI stamp so that if anyone made a copy of it, it would have "interference" if you will and would not be a clean copy.

I really doubt AWS would care, or know but I'll leave that up to others to discuss.

By 803056

Date 03-12-2013 15:20

I scanned my signature with the SCWI stamp and saved it as a JPEG.

I insert a text box in my word file where I want the signature and stamp to appear. I insert the JPEG file into the test box and then move the text box behind the text using the format menu. I again use the format menu to remove the outline from the text box. Then I save the Word file as a PDF. That pretty well locks everything in place and makes it more difficult for anyone to cut and paste it into a different file.

Be aware that if someone is intent on lifting your signature and your stamp from a document, they can do it if they are willing to spend the time and effort to do so. Computers are our friends, but they are also our enemy in the hands of someone that isn't honest. They can do the same with a scanned photocopied document imported into their computer, so nothing is absolutely safe.

Best regards - Al

By bozaktwo1 (***)

Date 03-12-2013 16:47

And just to add: the lower resolution you scan it at, the less likely a copy is going to look right, even though it will look okay on the monitor.

By Superflux (****)

Date 03-13-2013 16:22

I would be more concerned about the validity of copied signatures (if there are any) instead of "wet signatures" on altered/modified documents