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Generating custom Document IDs: Configuration and how to use them.
Generating custom Document IDs: Configuration and how to use them.

How to create and generate document numbers using custom patterns, and how to make sure a document number gets added into a document.

Daniels Korens avatar
Written by Daniels Korens
Updated over a month ago

You can align the document numbering within Sage HR according to the numbering pattern set in your organisation by using Document IDs. When you use this feature it adds a custom ID pattern for every document template you have in the system. The ID for a given template is generated automatically and you can insert it into a document using a placeholder.

This guide explains how this works.

📎NOTE: To set this feature you need Administrator-level access.

Creating Document ID patterns and allocating them to document templates

  1. Click on your name on the top right, then click Settings.

  2. On the settings menu, click Employee data, then click Document templates.

  3. Click New Document ID.

Here you can set up a Document ID pattern which is further applied to a document generated via specified Document Template.

Set up a new Document ID using the following fields:

  • Document template - a document template which will use the pattern you are creating. If you don't have a document template yet, you can add it later.

  • Pattern - the template which will be used to generate a factual ID in the document. To find out more about the possibilities of this field please read the section below

  • Start incrementing from - the value of numerical part which will be contained in your Document ID. This is useful if you already have some documents that are already numbered.

Configuring a pattern

Here's how you can configure your Pattern template.

The Pattern field allows you to configure how your Document ID will look every time you generate a new document from Document template. The key speciality of a pattern is the {#} placeholder. When you add this placeholder, it converts into a numerical value which is incremented each time you create a document from the linked document template.

As well as the placeholder, you can use letters and special characters to create informative patterns that later will be applied to your documents as Document IDs. Use the {#} placeholder to specify the location of numerical part in the ID.

Below is an example of how it may look:

EXAMPLES:

  • If incrementing from 1, this pattern will generate the next document ID of ABC-EMP-1;

  • If incrementing from 124, this pattern will generate the next document ID of ABC-EMP-125

📌TIP: You can add letters and special characters after the {#} placeholder. Just enter ABC-EMP-{#}-COOL to add COOL to your Document ID.

When done setting up your Pattern, remember to link it to a Document Template.
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Adding a Document ID to a document

When you have your Document ID pattern in place, you can insert it into a document to get our paperwork serialised.


To do this paste a placeholder {document_id} into your Document Template, like this:


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📎NOTE: Remember to upload and save the document template.


When generating a document from this document template, the {document_id} placeholder is replaced by a Document ID linked to the document template, according to specified pattern.

Below is an example of the generated document with a custom Document ID:

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