Make it easy to create PDF documents to attach to emails

[#1]

Like many people I use ACT! to generate both email and paper documents from ACT document templates. Some of these documents, such as quotations or invoices I need to email as PDF attachments.

This is where the current functionality is quite clunky.  Essentially, you have two options, neither of which are particularly appealing.

1. Create your merged Word document, then from Word, Sent E-Mail as PDF attachment. This does what it says on the tin, but the limitation is that you are now presented with an unaddressed Outlook email complete with PDF attachment. You now have to manually write the body of the email, and critically click the "To" button and manually find an select the ACT! Contact to whom you want the email sent. (Remember, this is the one that's actually currently open in your ACT! database, but you still have to manually find it again). You might also have to remember to manually click the Outlook Add-in tab and then select save Subject, message and attachment. Phew!

2. Create your merged Word document. Create your PDF from the Word document and save it to a folder. Back in ACT! Write > E-mail message from Template and select an email quotation cover letter ( "Thank you for your enquiry, please find our quotation attached" etc). New Outlook message is created from the template. Now manually find and attach your PDF quotation. You might also have to remember to manually click the Outlook Add-in tab and then select save Subject, message and attachment. Phew again!

What I want to be able to do is create a merged PDF document directly from within ACT. I would then like a wizard to ask me which email cover letter template I would like to use, then ACT! merges the email cover letter, attaches the PDF, and, if I've set it as a default, all emails containing attachments are saved into ACT! history with the attachment in the Documents Tab.

I don't want to have to manually pick which ACT record the email will attach to and I don't want to have to remember to reset the history option on the outgoing email (nobody ever remembers!).

To complete the process I would like to be able to add my custom email templates to the Write menu.

It's the little things that make all the difference!

Jeff

[#2]

Jeff,

Have you seen this:

http://www.kcisupport.com/products_actaddons.html

Regards,
Mike Lazarus
ACT! Evangelist
GL Computing, Australia
http://Blog.GLComputing.com.au
http://twitter.com/GLComputing

GL Computing Facebook Page - http://www.facebook.com/GLComputing
LinkedIN ACT! Fanatics Group - http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=49896

[#3]

MIke

That's a new one for me; I'll take a look.

I still maintain that this could be handled better within ACT though!

;-)

Jeff

[#4]

I agree. Even the add-on appears cumbersome. We have a Linked-in widget, a Swift-page widget and all sorts of other easy to use buttons. I guess this is a perfect example of give a little and everyone wants more- but how hard is it to add a "Convert to PDF" on the Add-In tab that pops up in Word? I also do quotes in Word- and I too have to send them as PDF. I use the same process as Jeff.

It kind of defeats the purpose of having the quote form as a template. Yes- the contact field info. merges- but the rest is a lot more cumbersome than just adding a name and phone number to a plain old Word document. My guys aren't using the ACT Quote form for this reason. (I find the Product list/capabilities kind of useless so I've had to completely re-do the quote form and I don't auto-populate the product info.)

More basic PDF compatibility please!

[#5]

And let you pre-define with the template a subject line. You could of course edit this when the email opens, before you click send, but autopopulate the subject line with perhaps the first line of the template?

[#6]

I am one of those always-asking-about-pushing-the-limits people

It would be great if ACT could write to a pdf form.

A service invoice pdf form could be generated from the current contact in ACT, filling in the address and customer number boxes on the form. Then the document can be emailed to the service technicians in the field on their iPads, who fill out the rest of the checkboxes and text fields on the form. The customer can sign on the iPad in the Adobe Reader app, and email a copy back to the office and to the customer.

[#7]

Yup. I've been asked for Service Engineer forms too.

[#8]

it would be good to have such service to create pdf document in act. any free trial version for us to try? i am looking for such service to generate pdf invoice. thank you

[#9]

Impact Suite v5 has a feature to convert to PDF which supports *.doc, *docx and *.rtf file formats.

After generating a quote, invoice or a proposal you want to open the document in MS Word for final changes. 
For this reason you select the *.doc format when using Impact Suite rather then merging to PDF.
( Or using the native act merge engine which only support *.doc formats)
For this reason we have added a "Convert to PDF" option on the documents tab in the opportunity list view.

Steps to convert to PDF: 

1. Select a document from under the DOCUMENTS tab
2. Click o n the CONVERT TO PDF button

A PDF version of the selected document will appear in the list.

You can download the free trial from our web site:

http://www.durkincomputing.com/

Thanks

-- Jim Durkin

[#10]

Hello! You may also try visiting this site (http://goo.gl/PeYB1U). You can have fillable pdf forms that can work with then email it to your recepients once done. You might want to try. .

[#11]

Please take a look at my new Act! AddOn product called FasterAct. www.fasteract.com

I believe that my product does EXACTLY what you are asking for!

Written documents and scanned documents are automatically placed in a Folder/SubFolder structure.

Please check out my website, download the trial and try it out.

Let me know if this is what you had in mind.

Kim