Manage form submissions
Read what people sent, correct who a link was for, and decide how long answers are kept or erase them.
Every time someone fills in your form, a submission arrives. Here's how to read them, and how to keep only what you need for as long as you need it.
Before you start: you need permission to view form submissions. Erasing answers needs an administrator, or someone who can both view and review form submissions.
Read submissions
Open the form
Go to Automations > Forms and open your form.
Go to Submissions
Select the Submissions tab. Each row is one submission. Filter and search the list like any other list in Givable.
Open one
Select a submission to see when and how it arrived, who sent it, its answers and, for an object form, the record it created.
Some answers can show as hidden. Answers to questions set to Admins only are shown only to administrators and people who may review the form, and answers saved to a field you don't have access to are left out.
Submissions waiting for approval
A form can hold each submission until it's approved. A waiting submission shows Awaiting approval, and nothing it creates is saved yet. See Approve form submissions.
When a submission needs attention
A form can also create other records with each submission. If one of them can't be saved, the submission is still kept with its answers, but none of its other records are, and it's marked Needs attention.
Open the submission. Under Records, each record shows whether it was saved and, if not, why. Fix the cause (for example, give the field it needed a value, or restore the record it links to), then select Re-run mapping. The records are created from the answers the submission kept.
Re-running needs permission to edit forms and to create every record the form creates. A submission whose answers were erased can't be re-run.
Correct who a link was for
A submission that came in through a link made for a particular supporter or lead shows who the link was for. If it's wrong (for example, someone forwarded the link), open the submission, select Change who the link was for and enter the right person's Givable ID, or clear it.
Decide how long answers are kept
Under Keeping answers in the form's settings, choose how long each submission's answers are kept, counted from when it was sent:
- Keep them, or
- Remove after a set time, from 30 days up to 3 years.
When the time is up, the submission's answers, and any file only it holds, are removed. The submission itself stays, marked as removed, so your counts still add up. Answers already saved on a record stay with that record.
A form shared by Public link collects answers from people outside your team, so you need to choose here before you can share it that way.
If you shorten the time, older answers are removed within a day. The change is recorded with who made it.
Erase one submission's answers
If someone asks you to delete what they sent, you don't have to wait. Open the submission and select Erase answers, then confirm.
This removes every answer on the submission, and any file only it holds, for good. It can't be undone. The submission stays, showing it was erased, and the action is recorded. Answers already saved on a record stay with that record: to remove those, update or erase the record itself.
When a supporter or lead's data is erased in Givable, the answers on forms they submitted are erased with it.
Do something after each submission
To send an email or a text, notify your team, create a task or add someone to a list after a form is submitted, open the form's Actions tab and select New action. It opens a new automation that already starts when this form is submitted. You need permission to build automations.
- Choose the form under Which form to use its answers: in a condition ("if the amount requested is over 500") or to fill in a record the automation creates.
- Answers only administrators can see can be used only by someone who can see them, and only work once such a person turns the automation on.
- To email the person who filled in the form, choose them as the recipient. Someone who wasn't signed in is emailed only once they've confirmed their address.
- The tab lists every automation this form starts, including ones that run for every form.
Troubleshooting
Related
Create a form
Build and publish a form.
Create other records from a form
Have each submission create records from its answers.
Still stuck?
We're here for you, and no question is too small. Tell us what you were trying to do and what happened, and we'll help you get it sorted.