Sign an employment agreement electronically

Can an employment agreement be signed electronically?

Yes. An employment agreement can be concluded orally, on paper or electronically. Swedish law sets no form requirement for the contract itself, and the eIDAS regulation (910/2014) states in article 25.1 that an electronic signature may not be denied legal effect solely on the grounds that it is in electronic form.

The interesting question arrives after the legal one. What can you show if someone says a year later that they never signed, or that the salary said something else?

A scanned signature in an email thread does not answer that. TRUE Sign logs when the contract was sent, when the link was opened, from which email address, and when the last party signed. The log travels inside the sealed PDF and can be checked without asking us.

What does the law require when you hire someone?

Written information about the terms, not a signature on paper. Under section 6 c of the Employment Protection Act (1982:80) the employer must give written information about every term of material importance to the employment no later than the seventh calendar day after the employee has started work. Further items follow within one month of the first working day.

The section got its current wording through SFS 2022:835, when the EU directive on transparent and predictable working conditions was implemented in Swedish law.

Seven calendar days is short for an HR manager running three recruitments at once. The contract gets written, emailed, and then sits with a candidate whose printer never works. A link that shows status in plain language tells you who has opened it, who has signed, and who needs a reminder.

How do you send an employment agreement for signing?

Upload the PDF, add the people who sign, place the signature fields and send. Each party gets a personal link and signs on any device.

1. Upload the contract

   Your finished PDF, the same document you would otherwise have printed.

2. Add the signers

   Name and email for the new hire and for whoever signs for the company.

3. Place the fields

   Signature, date and any field you want the other party to fill in.

4. Send

   Everyone gets a personal link. Nobody creates an account or installs anything.

5. Sealed

   When the last party signs, the document is sealed and everyone receives the finished PDF.

What proof do you have that the employee signed?

Every completed document is sealed with a Proof of Signing: timestamps for each event, the email address that opened and signed, and a SHA 256 fingerprint of the finished file. The fingerprint is written to a blockchain.

Change a single character in the PDF and the fingerprint no longer matches. Anyone holding the document can check it in TRUE Verify, free and without an account.

Signer identity is tied to the email address that received the link. How sealing and storage work is described on the security page.

When is an electronic signature not enough?

When the law sets a form requirement. A Swedish future power of attorney must under section 4 of the Future Powers of Attorney Act (2017:310) be signed in the simultaneous presence of two witnesses, and a purchase of real property requires a deed signed by seller and buyer under chapter 4 section 1 of the Land Code.

The employment agreement is not one of those. Neither is the NDA, the consulting agreement or the shareholders agreement. Where the line runs for powers of attorney is set out on the power of attorney page.

What does it cost to sign an employment agreement electronically?

The first three contracts are free. After that Core is 90 EUR per year. Business costs 180 EUR per user per year and gives the whole HR function one shared workspace.

Verification is free for everyone, including people who never had an account with us. See pricing or start with your first contract.