Email signature policy: a short template for staff

An email signature policy is a short document that says who owns the company’s signature, what every signature must contain, what staff may add, and what happens when one is wrong. This page gives you the text of one, in eleven clauses, with the choices you need to make marked in square brackets. Copy it, fill it in, and have whoever advises you on legal matters read it before you publish.

It is written for a company of ten to a few hundred people. Smaller ones can delete clauses until it fits on one page, which is a perfectly good outcome.

What a company email signature policy covers

People often mix up three documents. A style guide says how the signature looks. A rollout plan says how it gets into mailboxes. A policy says who is responsible and what the rules are. The first two change often. The policy should not.

That is why an email signature policy refers to the other documents instead of repeating them. If the policy says “use the current template”, then a rebrand means you replace the template and leave the policy alone. For the wider job of getting one design to every person, see our guide to company email signatures.

The wording below is deliberately plain. A policy that needs a lawyer to decode it will not be followed by the person in accounts who needs a new phone number added.

Email signature policy template: the full text

Replace anything in [square brackets]. Where a clause offers two options, delete the one you do not want.

1. Purpose and scope

1. This policy sets out how [COMPANY NAME] employees, contractors and anyone else sending email on its behalf use email signatures.
2. It applies to every mailbox that sends email under a [COMPANY DOMAIN] address, on every device.
3. The aim is that every message from the company looks like it came from one organisation and carries the details the company has to show.

2. Ownership

1. The signature owner is [ROLE, for example the office manager]. They approve the template, approve changes, and keep this policy up to date.
2. The technical contact is [ROLE, for example the IT administrator]. They make changes in the mail platform or tool, and keep a record of who changed what and when.
3. Staff send requests for changes to [ADDRESS OR CHANNEL]. Staff do not alter the company template themselves.

3. Mandatory content

Every signature includes:

1. The employee’s name, written the way they introduce themselves to clients.
2. Their job title, in the style set out in [LINK TO BRAND GUIDELINES].
3. The company name.
4. One direct phone number in international format, or the main switchboard number if the person has no direct line.
5. The company website.
6. The legal line set out in clause 6, wherever clause 6 says it is required.

4. What staff may add

1. Staff may add: [CHOOSE FROM professional credentials, a booking link, a photo, pronouns, a second language version of the title].
2. Staff may not add anything that is not on this list without approval from the signature owner.
3. [OPTION A: Photos are optional and follow the format in the template. OPTION B: Photos are not used.]

5. What is not allowed

1. Quotations, slogans, jokes, religious or political messages, and personal social media links.
2. Images pasted from a document or another email. Use the company logo file only.
3. Extra colours, fonts or font sizes.
4. Promotional banners, other than those in clause 7.
5. Any statement about the company’s services, prices or guarantees that Legal or the owner has not approved.

6. Legal and confidentiality lines

1. The company’s registration line reads: [EXACT TEXT]. It is part of the template and cannot be removed or edited by staff.
2. The confidentiality notice reads: [EXACT TEXT, OR “None”]. It is added to [ALL MESSAGES / EXTERNAL MESSAGES ONLY].
3. The wording was approved by [NAME OR ADVISER] on [DATE]. Only that person approves changes to it.

7. Banners and promotions

1. Only [ROLE, for example marketing] may request a banner.
2. A banner has an owner, a start date and an end date, all recorded before it goes live.
3. There is one banner at a time. It is removed on its end date even if the campaign continues.

8. Joiners, movers and leavers

1. The manager of a new starter tells the technical contact the person’s start date. The signature is ready before the first day.
2. When someone changes role, office or phone number, they tell the technical contact within [FIVE] working days.
3. When someone leaves, their access is removed on the last day and any shared copy of their signature is switched off.
4. Mailboxes kept for a successor or for a team use the team’s details, not the leaver’s name.

9. Exceptions

1. A department may ask for a different template or an extra field by writing to the owner with the reason.
2. The owner records each approved exception, with the reason and an end date, in [LOCATION].
3. Exceptions are reviewed at each policy review and removed if the reason has gone.

10. Review

1. The owner checks a sample of real outgoing messages from [FIVE OR MORE] people across different teams every [SIX] months.
2. The owner reviews this policy every [TWELVE] months, and after any rebrand, office move or change of legal details.
3. The review date is recorded at the foot of this document.

11. Breaches

1. If a signature does not follow this policy, the owner tells the person and gives them [FIVE] working days to correct it with the current template.
2. Repeated or deliberate breaches go to the person’s line manager.
3. This clause is about signatures. It is not a replacement for the company’s wider conduct rules.

Owner: [NAME]. Last reviewed: [DATE]. Next review: [DATE].

Decisions to make before you adopt it

The email signature policy template has bracketed choices because companies differ. Here is how most small teams settle the main ones, as a starting point and not as a rule.

Clause	Decision	A sensible default
2	Who owns it	The person who can say yes or no without a meeting
3	Direct phone or switchboard	Direct line where one exists
4	Photos	One rule for everyone, since a mixed set looks accidental
6	Where the legal line lives	In the template or the platform footer, never in both
7	Banner owner	One role, with an end date written down first
10	Review rhythm	Twice a year for the sample, once a year for the text

If you are not sure who should own the signature, the article on who is responsible for company email signatures goes through the usual candidates.

Which clauses your mail platform can enforce

A policy is only paper until something makes it easy to follow. Two platform features help, and both have limits.

These details follow Google’s help page on user signatures (last updated 1 October 2026) and Microsoft’s page on organization-wide email signatures (page date 7 May 2026), both read in October 2026.

• Google Workspace. An admin can set an appended footer. Google says users cannot change or remove it, and that changes can take up to 24 hours. That fits clause 6, the locked legal line. The page describes footer text, not a name or phone number filled in for each person.
• Microsoft 365. An admin can create a mail flow rule that appends a disclaimer, which is Microsoft’s word for any organisation-wide signature. That also fits clause 6. Microsoft lists limits, including that rules skip a line whose variable they cannot fill. If a person has no phone number in the directory, the line is dropped, so clause 8 matters.

Neither page describes how to enforce the rest of the policy: the title style, the photo rule or the ban on quotations. That depends on giving people a template that already follows the rules.

Make the email signature policy easy to follow

A company email signature policy fails quietly. Nobody argues with it. They just keep the signature they had. Three habits prevent that.

1. Ship the template with the policy. Send both on the same day. People copy a template far more readily than they apply a description.
2. Put the one-page summary where people look. Clauses 3 to 5 fit on a card. Pin them in your staff chat or onboarding pack.
3. Check what goes out. The sampling in clause 10 is the whole enforcement mechanism for most firms. Our email signature audit guide shows what to look at.

A shared-design tool such as emailfooter can help with the template half: the admin fixes layout, logo, colours and a legal footer, and each employee edits only their own details. It does not install the signature for anyone, so clause 10 still has work to do.

Here is a signature that follows the policy above. The company fixes the layout and the legal line, and the person supplies the rest.

A profile layout with a locked legal line. The company and person are made up.

Keeping the email signature policy current

Review the policy when the company changes, not on the calendar alone. A move, a merger or a new regulator line can make a clause wrong overnight. Record the review date at the foot of the page, as the template does, so the next person can see how old it is.

Legal lines differ by country. The wording in clause 6 of your email signature policy should come from someone qualified to advise on your jurisdiction, and this page is general information, not legal advice.

Frequently asked questions

What should an email signature policy include?

At least: who owns the signature, the mandatory fields, what staff may add or not add, the legal line, what happens when someone joins or leaves, and a review date. The template above covers each in a short clause.

Is an email signature policy the same as brand guidelines?

No. Brand guidelines describe how the signature looks. A policy says who is responsible and what follows when the rules are ignored. Many small firms write guidelines first and add an email signature policy when they need one.

How long should a company email signature policy be?

One or two pages. If it grows beyond that, move the detail into a style guide and keep the policy to responsibilities and rules.

Can I enforce an email signature policy technically?

Partly. Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 can each append locked text to outgoing mail, which suits a legal line. Everything else depends on the template people use and the checks you run.