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Sealing & sending guide

Two parts: verifying your identity once, and what actually happens every time you seal and send an invoice after that.

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A Verified Badge stamped in the corner of a freelance invoice — the SignedBy mark, a scannable QR code with a green verified checkmark, and a verification link← Back to Verified Badge for Invoices

Part 1 — Verifying your identity (one time only)

Your very first Verified Badge seal includes a one-time identity check. Everything after that is just two clicks.

1

Open the Verified Badge tab

Open the Verified Badge tab

Dashboard → New Document → Verified Badge tab. This is a separate track from the Sign tab — there's no recipient to add and nothing to sign, just a file to seal.

2

Choose your invoice PDF

Choose your invoice PDF

PDFs only. If your invoice comes out of accounting software as something else, export or print it to PDF first. Give it a title, then hit Seal this file.

3

Verify your identity (one-time)

Verify your identity (one-time)

Your very first seal needs a government-ID check, hosted by Stripe and usually done in under a minute. Every seal after this one reuses it automatically — you won't see this screen again.

4

You're sealed

You're sealed

SignedBy hashes the file, timestamps it with a real Time Stamping Authority (Sectigo, with EuroTSA and then FreeTSA as automatic fallbacks), and generates your badge — then drops you onto the document's own page.

Good to know

The identity check is org-level, not per-document — anyone on your team who seals a document later reuses the same verified check once they've done it themselves. Free plan includes 3 Verified Badge seals a month; Pro and Team include 100 free document sends or seals a month combined; Business is unlimited.

Part 2 — Sealing and sending an invoice, every time

This is what actually happens once you're verified and it's time to send a real invoice.

1

Seal the next invoice

Seal the next invoice

Same tab, same two steps — choose the file, hit Seal this file. No identity check this time; that's a one-time cost, not a per-invoice one.

2

Your outputs are ready

Your outputs are ready

Every seal gives you a Badge image, a Sealed PDF, a Certificate, and a copy/QR of the verify link — all on the document's own page in your dashboard. For an invoice, the Badge image is the one to use: a small mark you drop straight into the file, nothing else to manage.

3

Drop the badge onto your invoice

Drop the badge onto your invoice

Paste the badge image into a corner of your invoice before you send it — same as adding a logo. It carries the QR code, the SignedBy mark, and a short verification link as plain text, so it still reads as legitimate even printed or screenshotted.

4

Your client scans it

Your client scans it

Their camera opens the verify page directly — no app, no account. It confirms two separate facts: the file hasn't changed since it was sealed, and whoever sealed it passed a real identity check. That's a genuine way to check, not just trusting that an email looks right.

Good to know

  • A Verified Badge proves your invoice existed, unaltered, as of a cryptographically verified timestamp, sealed by an identity-verified person — a real, useful, different claim from "this looks legitimate." It doesn't stop someone from faking a different invoice, and it doesn't claim to.
  • Prefer to keep the original file completely untouched? Use the Certificate output instead of the badge — it files the same proof separately rather than stamping the PDF itself, which is usually the better fit for a dataroom than for an invoice you're handing to one client.
  • You can also seal a file from Console chat or the API instead of the dashboard — see the developer docs.

Try SignedBy free

3 Verified Badge seals a month, no credit card, upgrade only if you need more.

Get Your Verified Badge Now →