How to configure letter templates
The functionality for working with templates is located in the "System Administrations" section, under the "Letter Templates" subsection.
Note: The visual appearance of this section may vary depending on the brand.
In this subsection, you will find a list of existing and uploaded letter templates, as well as functionality that allows you to:
1. Create a new letter template – Use the "Create new template" button to generate a new template in the system. There is also a "Delete" button to remove an existing template from the list.
2. Deactivate/Activate letter templates – Use the "Deactivate"/"Activate" buttons.
It's important to understand that in order to generate a document template in the system, it must be active in the template list.
3. Download the current document – Use the "Download" button for the document currently used for generating this template, or Upload a new updated document through the "Upload" button to be used for template generation.
4. Enter the "Show available merged fields" subsection to explore the list of existing tags and their descriptions, which can be utilized when working with letter template documents.
If you need to change a letter template, it is important to know which specific letter template needs modification. For this, you need to know the template ID. This is also necessary to download the current document (original) so that it can be compared with the new version or compared with the list of changes by pages.
How to edit templates using MS Word
Configure the Word text editor and enable the following options, as they are useful and will greatly assist in working with templates:
1) Show formatting marks – This allows you to see all spaces, page breaks, paragraphs, and other markup elements in the document.
2) Ruler – This allows you to see page margins, header heights, and if there are tables in the document, it also shows the boundaries of their columns and rows.
3) You can set up and adjust the margins and layout in advance using the Margins option so that all elements on the pages display according to a uniform grid, or you can individually customize the margins and spacing for a specific page or section.
4) It is important to pay attention to page breaks and designate them using "Page Break" or "Section Break: Next Page" to ensure that text and elements do not spill over to another page.
It is crucial to monitor the layout of these elements on the page after adding new elements like text, pictures, and tables.
Tip: Almost all letter templates include tables, and often, for better alignment and placement of information on the page, data and text are placed in tables with some cell borders hidden. Therefore, it's important to use options like setting "All borders" to view the structure of the cells and, if necessary, adjust the cells (merge, split into multiple cells, or add new ones). Additionally, make sure to check the text alignment within the cells using the options Align Left, Center Text, and Align Right.
For adding and placing pictures on pages, refer to the existing article - [How to Pin Header Footer in the Letter Templates]
Tip: To fix a picture in a selected area on the page, it is advisable to lock the Anchor by following these steps: click on the picture -> Picture Format section -> Wrap Text option -> More Layout Options from the dropdown -> Position section -> Lock anchor checkbox.
If it is necessary to add or replace existing tags on a page, refer to the article - [Tags for Letter Templates and How to Use Them]
Tip: The simplest way to insert a new tag is to copy an existing one and edit its name using the Toggle Field Codes function, ensuring that the surrounding “__” of the tag are not erased, but only its name is edited. Existing tags can be viewed in the "Show available merged fields" section. However, if you cannot find a suitable tag, it is better to consult support. It's important to consider that some tags display data in different formats, such as additionally adding a currency symbol or decimal fractions.
How to generate a document using a template
1) To generate a letter template, navigate to the Student profile and go to the "Documents/Letters" tab. Then, click the "+" button. In this tab, you can also view all the letters that have been previously generated.
2) After clicking "+", you will need to specify a name for the letter, select the student application for which you want to generate the letter, and choose the letter template from the list.
3) Then, move to the next step, where you will see all the tags embedded in the document and the values they have pulled in. (If a tag is missing, it might be incorrectly inserted in the document, or there might be an error in the tag's name; if a value field is empty, it is likely that the student information is missing.)
3) Next, click the "Generate" button, and after some time, the template will be generated into a document, which can be downloaded in either of two formats: PDF or Word.
It is also important to remember that not all templates are generated in the system through the "Documents/Letters" section. There are templates such as "Invoices," "Receipts," and "Installment plans" which are generated based on a predetermined logic and algorithm.
For instance, a user generates an invoice for a student by selecting the invoice template and choosing (checkboxes) the necessary products that should be included in the invoice.
After clicking the "Create Invoice" button, the generated invoice can be found and downloaded in the "Invoices" tab.
Accordingly, receipts are generated in the system after the user has made transactions for selected products in the "Pay" section. After this, the receipt will appear in the "Receipts" tab, from where it can be downloaded.
To generate "Installment Plans", the user will add the necessary installments for products through the "Installments" section. After this, the generated "Installment Plan" can be downloaded at the product level.
Tip: Since multiple products can be listed in Invoices, Receipts, Instalment plans, "Bookmarks" must be added to the template document to pull all necessary data for all selected products.
Note the specific Bookmarks to be inserted according to the template type:
Invoice template: | Receipt template: | Installment plan template: |
- blockstart_courses - blockend_courses | - blockstart_products - blockend_products | - blockstart_installments - blockend_installments |