Exporting your data

You can download everything on your account as a single ZIP without asking anyone. Use it as a backup, as a way to move data into another tool, or as a record before you close the account. Open Account and click Export my data on the Your data card, or go straight to the export page.

Taking one

The export page has two tabs. Your data is everything on the account. Submitted files is the documents people uploaded to your requests, which come as a separate ZIP (see below).

On Your data, click Download my data. A confirmation asks you to tick one box: that you will open the ZIP afterwards and check it. Tick it, click Download, and the file starts.

That step is there because a download that fails partway looks a lot like one that worked. If you are exporting because you are about to delete the account, open the ZIP and look inside before you do anything else.

The ZIP is built as it downloads, so an account with a lot of files takes a while. Keep the tab open until the download starts, and let it run.

You can take one export every 3 hours, and the submitted files download has its own 3 hours, so one never holds up the other. Inside that window the button is greyed out and the page shows when the next one is available.

What is inside

README.txt first. It describes every folder and file in that particular export, and it is more current than any article can be.

data/ holds one CSV per kind of record: your portals, contacts, requests, the answers people gave, tasks and workflows, automations, branding themes, email history, and so on. Every row has an id, and records that belong to another carry its id (a request row carries the id of the portal it sits on), so you can join them back together in a spreadsheet. Dates and times are UTC.

files/ holds the actual files, in folders by where they came from: files you attached to a portal, your file library (with earlier versions of replaced files), reference files you pinned to a request, files you attached to a contact yourself, signatures people drew when signing off a request, contact photos, and your branding logos. Each file is named with the id of the row it belongs to, so you can match it to a CSV row.

profile.json and manifest.json are small: your account email and id, and when the export was generated.

EXPORT-NOTES.txt appears only if something could not be included, and says what. If you see it, read it before you rely on the export.

What is deliberately left out

Sensitive information, unless you ask for it. Answers to requests and fields marked Sensitive are written as (sensitive), and sensitive files you attached to contacts are left out. To include them, tick the sensitive information box in the download box. It says exactly what it adds, for example "Include 38 sensitive answers and 12 sensitive files in full", and it only appears when there is something to include.

Ticking it asks for your password. A wrong password downloads nothing and doesn't use up your 3 hours. When the download goes ahead, it is recorded in the sensitive information access log, and we email you when it happened and what it included. If you get that email and it wasn't you, change your password and reply to it. See Keeping sensitive information private.

The documents people uploaded to your requests. On an onboarding account that is most of what you hold, and it has its own tab: Submitted files. Those files were submitted by the people they are about, so they come as their own ZIP rather than mixed into the main one:

• files/ has a folder per portal, named with its date, and a folder per person inside it. Each file is named after the request it answers.
• submitted-files.csv lists every file: who uploaded it, for which request, when, its expiry date, whether it was approved, and whether it is sensitive. Files that aren't in the ZIP are listed too, with the reason.

Sensitive documents (a TFN declaration, a passport) follow the same rule as sensitive answers: left out unless you tick the box and enter your password, and recorded and emailed to you when you do. A sensitive file still being checked for viruses is never included, so download again once the check has finished. Before the download starts you confirm that you will keep the files secure and delete them when you no longer need them.

The answers themselves are in the main export. Text and choice answers, terms acceptances (who accepted, when, and which version), and the record that someone submitted a document are all in the CSVs. Only the uploaded files are missing.

Portal links. Anyone holding a link can use it, so the links themselves stay in the app, where you can revoke them at any time. What does export is the record of who had a link and when it was issued or emailed.

One restriction

Only the account owner can take an export. Someone switched into your account through account sharing is refused, because handing over the whole account in one file is your decision.

Getting help

If the ZIP looks short or a file you expected is missing, tell us before you do anything irreversible. Email [email protected] with roughly when you took the export and what you expected to find.