I changed the signature but people still send the old one
How quickly a change to a template, a rule or someone's details reaches their email, and what to check when the old signature keeps turning up.
When you save a change in Footer365, nothing has to be updated in Exchange Online. The Footer365 mail flow rule only sends mail to Footer365, and the signature is chosen and built for each message as it passes through, so a change is used for new mail almost straight away. If the old signature is still turning up, one of the causes below is almost always the reason. Work through them in order.
If your organisation uses the Outlook add-in only, every signature is put in by the add-in, so the last row of the table below applies to all of your mail.
How long each kind of change takes
| What you changed | When new mail uses it |
|---|---|
| A template, saved in the editor | Within a minute |
| A signature rule: its template, who it covers, or its order | Within a minute |
| A value under User details in the portal | The next message the person sends |
| A value in a file a source reads | After the source's next run (every 4, 12 or 24 hours, or at once with Run now), then the next message |
| A detail in Microsoft 365, such as a job title or phone number | After the next directory sync, then the next message |
| A group's members in Microsoft 365 | After the next directory sync, then the next message |
| Anything, for a message written with the Outlook add-in | The next new message, reply or forward the person starts |
The directory sync runs every four hours, and sooner when Microsoft 365 tells Footer365 that a user has changed. You can run one yourself with Sync now. See How directory sync works.
1. The old signature is in the quoted part of a reply
This is the most common cause. On a reply or forward, the earlier messages in the thread are quoted with the signatures they were sent with. Footer365 adds the new signature above the quoted part, and by default keeps the earlier signatures as they were sent, because the quoted part is a copy of what was actually sent. If your Long conversations setting shortens or removes earlier signatures, your organisation's own earlier signatures in the quoted part are shortened to one line or taken out, whichever design they were sent with, as long as they were sent since that setting was introduced. See Earlier signatures and banners in long conversations.
Check: send a brand-new message, not a reply or forward, to an address outside your organisation, and look at that.
2. The template that was changed is not the one in use
A person gets the template of the first rule that matches them, so a change to a different template makes no difference to them. Templates with similar names, or a copy made with Duplicate, are easy to mix up.
Check: on the Signature rules page, select Test a rule and enter the person. Rule matched: shows the rule they get, and the rule shows its template. See Test a rule.
Fix: edit the template that rule uses, or change the rule to use the template you edited.
3. The change was not saved, or an earlier version was put back
A template is used as it was last saved. A change still open in the editor, or one that was followed by a restore from the history, is not what is being sent.
Check: open the template and select History. The version marked Current is the one your rules use, and it shows when it was saved. See Version history.
4. The message was written with the Outlook add-in before the change
The add-in puts the signature into the message when the person starts writing it, and Footer365 does not sign that message again on the way out. A message started before the change, including a draft saved earlier and sent later, keeps the signature it was given.
Fix: start a new message. The add-in fetches the signature afresh each time a new message, reply or forward is started. See I cannot see my signature while writing.
5. The details come from Microsoft 365 and have not synced yet
A new job title, phone number or office changed in Microsoft 365 reaches Footer365 at the next directory sync, and so does a change to who is in a group a rule is aimed at.
Fix: go to Directory > Users and groups (open it), select Sync now, and wait for Last sync to show a newer time. If a detail is still wrong after that, see Details in the signature are missing or wrong.
6. The old signature comes from somewhere other than Footer365
If the old design appears as well as, or instead of, the one in Footer365, it is being added by something else:
- People's own Outlook signatures. Outlook adds its own saved signature while the person writes. See Keeping or turning off people's own Outlook signatures.
- A mail flow rule in your Exchange Online, such as an older disclaimer rule that still adds its text. In the Exchange admin centre, go to Mail flow, then Rules, and look for any rule that adds a disclaimer. Do not change the rules whose names start with Footer365.
- Another signature product that is still connected. See Switching from another signature service.
7. Mail from the person is not reaching Footer365 at all
If nothing you change makes any difference, the message may not be getting a Footer365 signature at all, and what you are seeing is the person's own Outlook signature. With the Outlook add-in only, that is what happens to mail written anywhere but Outlook with the add-in. See The signature was not added.
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