How to change the wording of the automated emails Validis sends
Validis sends automated emails on your behalf: invitations, password resets, upload reminders, reconciliation updates and more. Every one of them comes from a template you can edit, so the wording your clients receive can be yours rather than ours. New portals start with the Validis defaults.
You can change the subject and the message body of each template and preview the result before you save it.
Please note
You need the appropriate permissions to reach Portal Settings.
Finding the settings
Select the settings icon at the top right of the portal, beside the help icon.
That opens Portal Settings. In the menu on the left, select Email settings.
Finding the right template
Templates are grouped by category, and each category expands to show the notifications inside it. There are a lot of them, so the quickest route is usually the search box, which matches on both the notification name and the category.
Every row has two controls in the Action column. The pencil opens the template for editing, and the icon beside it previews the template as it stands.
Previewing a notification
The preview shows you three things: the Subject, the Body as it is written, and a Preview of how it will reach the recipient.
The names, dates and company in the preview are examples, filled in so you can see the shape of the finished email. Your recipients see their own details in those places.
Editing a notification
The pencil opens the editor. Subject is a plain text field with no formatting, and it is required. The body below it has a full editor, with bold, italic, underline, alignment, lists and indenting. The toolbar scrolls sideways if the window is too narrow to show every control at once.
A live Preview sits underneath the editor and updates as you type, so you can see the effect of a change without leaving the window. When you are happy, select Save. Selecting Cancel discards everything you have changed.
Working with variables
The parts written like ${user.firstName} are variables. Validis swaps each one for real data at the moment the email is sent, so ${user.firstName} ${user.lastName} becomes the name of the person receiving it. They are what let one template serve every recipient.
The Variable list beside the subject field shows what is available to you, which saves typing them from memory. The full set is listed in Email Placeholders.
Editing hyperlinks
Some templates, password reset and invitations among them, contain hyperlinks built from variables such as ${domain} and ${user.resetToken}. These need more care than ordinary text.
If you use the editor's Insert/Edit Link tool on one of them, check that the URL field still contains the variables exactly as they were, for example ${domain}/#/account/reset/${user.resetToken}.
Deleting or retyping a variable breaks the link. The email still goes out and still looks right, but the recipient cannot complete their password reset or activate their account, and you will only hear about it when they tell you. If in doubt, compare what you have against Email Placeholders before saving.