Smokeball’s letter automation tools make it easy to generate consistent, professional correspondence directly from your matters. When you need to send the same letter to multiple contacts – such as clients, court-related parties, or others involved in your matter – Smokeball allows you to quickly create and customise individual letters for each recipient, or easily send the same letter to multiple recipients at once.
This support article will guide you through the steps to efficiently generate letters for multiple recipients within a matter, ensuring accuracy and saving valuable time.
Create Letters for Multiple Recipients
When generating a blank letter, you can select multiple recipients by ticking the checkbox next to each contact you wish to include.
Depending on your recipient selection, you will be presented with a number of letter creation and formatting preferences.
Expand the headings below for more information on each letter creation option.
Multiple Letters to Multiple Recipients
Multiple Letters to Multiple Recipients
To create and send multiple individual letters to multiple recipients:
- Go to New Document > Letter to open the new letter window.
- Select your Letterhead.
- Choose the required recipients by ticking the checkbox next to each contact.
- From the Layout Options in the bottom-left of the new letter window, select One document per addressee.
- Select Create [No.] Documents.
Note: The number displayed in the “Create Documents” button reflects how many letters will be generated. - Microsoft Word will launch with your selected letterhead and the details of the first receipient.
- Draft your letter to the first recipient, then select Save & Next from the Word ribbon.
Note: “Save & Next” is the multi-document equivalent of “Save & Close” that normally appears in the Word ribbon. - Word will save and close the current letter, then reopen with the details of the next receipient.
- Repeat this process until a letter has been created for each selected recipient.
Single Letter to Multiple Recipients
Single Letter to Multiple Recipients
To create one letter to addressed multiple recipients:
- Go to New Document > Letter to open the new letter window.
- Select your Letterhead.
- Choose the required recipients by ticking the checkbox next to each contact.
- From the Layout Options in the bottom-left of the new letter window, select One document with all addressees listed.
- Select Create 1 Document.
- Microsoft Word will launch with your selected letterhead and the details of the all selected recipients.
- Draft your letter, then select Save & Close from the Word ribbon to save the letter to your matter.
Multiple People at the Same Address
Multiple People at the Same Address
When sending letters to multiple people, Smokeball automatically identifies recipients sharing the same address and gives the option to combine them into a single address block. This feature is available when creating either Multiple Letters to Multiple Recipients or a Single Letter to Multiple Recipients, as described above.
To combine letter recipients at the same address:
- Go to New Document > Letter to open the new letter window.
- Select your Letterhead.
- Choose the required recipients by ticking the checkbox next to each contact.
- From the Layout Options in the bottom-left of the new letter window, select One document per addressee or One document with all addressees listed as required.
- Select Merge people residing at the same address.
Note: This option will only be available if two or more person recipients share an identical address.
- Microsoft Word will launch with your selected letterhead. Recipients at the same address will be grouped on a single line followed by their address block.
- Draft your letter, then select Save & Close from the Word ribbon to save the letter to your matter.
Did You Know:
- Merging of contacts at the same address only applies to person contact cards. If an organisation, such as a home business, shares the same address as a person being written to, they will not be merged and will appear as separate addressees.
- The option to merge contacts at the same address will only appear if the addresses are an exact match. If you have a scenario where you are expecting this checkbox to appear and it doesn't, check your contact for any typos in their address.
Multiple recipients on Precedent Letters
The same multiple recipient options described above are also available when generating documents from the Forms & Precedents library, depending on the addressee(s) configured in the precedent.
When launching a precedent with multiple recipients, the Select a Party window will appear. From there, you can:
- Select the recipients
- Select the layout option (one document per addressee or a combined document)
- Merge people residing at the same address, if applicable
This allows for consistent handling of address blocks whether you are drafting a custom letter or using a standard precedent.