Forms

Forms gather data from users and can be used for a variety of purposes. By default, your website will have a “contact” form, but you can create forms for any purpose, with lots of flexibility. 

When creating a form, you must first name it. Having done this, your form now exists but has no content. You have two options: 

1. Change form name and email settings
2. Add a form field

You can also see and export your form submissions.

Change form name and email settings

Quite simply, you can modify, here, the name of the form and who should be notified when a user submits a form. Note, this will not send an email to the user. You can add multiple email addresses to these fields if the completed form needs to be sent to multiple people in your organisation.

The content/appearance of the email that is sent is tied into email templates, particularly the template that is chosen when adding the form to a page (see the web forms page for more details). 

Add a form field

Your form is divided into sections, which you can manually name and edit. These sections merely serve to organise the form, they have no function beyond that, so are optional. They might be helpful, however, if you have a particularly long form for users to complete (though note, it is best to keep forms short and simple).

Adding a form field permits adding a variety of different options, which are detailed below.

	Checkbox list	A list of options, allowing a user to select one or more options from the list.
	Confirm boxes	Two small text boxes, into which a user must put the same content. You often see this when signing up for an account and having to confirm your password.
	Date picker	The user selects a date from a small calendar drop down.
	Dropdown list	The user selects one option from a dropdown list of multiple options.
	Paragraph	You can insert a paragraph of text into the form, perhaps with instructions for the user.
	Radio button list	A list of options, allowing a user to select one option from the list.
	Required checkbox	A single checkbox that must be selected by the user in order to complete the form. This can be used for acceptance of terms and conditions, or similar.
	Spam blocker	Inserts a captcha, reducing the probability that spam can get through.
	Text box	The user inputs a piece of text, the size of this box is decided by you.

These fields can be added to the form, then freely organised in any order you like. 

Form field settings

Every form field has a name and ID that you can customise. The ID is important as it is linked to email templates. This is discussed in more detail on the Web Forms page.

You also need to input a question, which is what the user will see to prompt them to input their data. You can also choose whether the form field should be required or not. If it is not required, users can submit your form without inputting data into that particular field. 

Form submissions

When a form on the website is filled in by a user, the submitted information is sent to the owner of the form via email. 

The information is also stored in a database on the website, which we call the form submission table. This is only visible to website administrators who have approved access. The time that this information is stored can be set by Blue Level from 'never' to 'indefinitely'. In order to comply with best practice in relation to GDPR, we recommend that the information is stored for no longer than 90 days. 

The information can also be moved from the form submission table into an excel spreadsheet, that can be stored locally on a computer. This is called exporting the form data. Doing so will make you solely responsible for complying with GDPR in relation to storing data on your personal/work machine.

To do this, go to the Admin Area and click on form submissions. Click on the export form submissions (MS Excel) button. The file will download onto a local drive on the computer, from where the information can be processed and stored.