The highest level of electronic signature defined by eIDAS — legally equivalent to a handwritten signature in the 27 Member States of the European Union. Delivered by a qualified trust service provider (QTSP) listed on the EU trust list. No subscription, no commitment, billed on usage.
Qualified Electronic Signature (QES — Qualified Electronic Signature) is defined in Articles 3(12) and 26 of the European eIDAS regulation (EU) No 910/2014. It is based on a digital certificate issued personally to the signer after strict verification of their identity, and created via a qualified signature creation device (QSCD) managed by a qualified trust service provider (QTSP) listed on the European trust list.
Article 25(2) of eIDAS gives it unique legal value: QES is strictly equivalent to a handwritten signature in the 27 Member States, without additional formality. It is the only level of electronic signature that benefits from this strong legal presumption at the European level.
QES is billed at €9.90 per signature, in addition to your Certyneo subscription. No package, no minimum, no commitment. You only pay for what you sign.
| QES signatures / month | Monthly cost incl. VAT | Typical profile |
|---|---|---|
| 1 signature | €9.90 | One-off transaction — INPI filing, public procurement, notarial act |
| 5 signatures | €49.50 | Law or notary firm — regulated monthly acts |
| 20 signatures | €198 | Average notary firm — routine acts + notarial acts |
| 50 signatures | €495 | Corporate / M&A firm — closings and high-stakes acts |
| 100+ signatures | Volume pricing | Enterprise Contract — discount negotiated by monthly volume |
Price incl. VAT. Billed at end of month via Stripe in addition to your Certyneo subscription (Standard, Business or Business Pro). Beyond 100 signatures/month, volume pricing is negotiated in the Enterprise contract — contact the sales team.
QES becomes necessary as soon as the law explicitly requires it, or when the risk of dispute demands maximum evidential force. Here are the six use cases that represent the core of QES demand in 2026.
Notarial powers of attorney, electronic authentic acts, gifts between living persons: QES is required by Decree No. 2017-770 when the authentic act is drawn up on electronic medium. Evidential force equivalent to handwritten signature before a notary.
Trademark and patent filings with INPI, declarations to the Beneficial Owners Register (RBE), annual accounts filings with commercial court registries — these portals require electronic signature with embedded cryptographic proof and qualified certificate.
Responses to public procurement requiring qualified signature (major EU tenders, sovereign contracts, defense contracts). Decree No. 2016-360 and the PLACE platform impose QES for certain public procurement thresholds.
M&A closings, business sales, merger-acquisition acts, shareholders'' agreements worth tens of millions: QES rules out any possible dispute over the signer''s identity or the integrity of the act.
Operations requiring the highest level of customer identification (AML-CFT, high-stakes contracts, ACPR/AMF requests). QES guarantees cryptographic proof of the signer''s consent with audit trail embedded in the PDF.
International mobility agreements, termination agreements in high-risk contentious contexts, international contracts subject to foreign jurisdictions that explicitly require eIDAS QES to recognize the act.
Four steps — approximately 3 to 5 minutes for the first document, less than a minute for subsequent ones once identity is verified.
Import the PDF to sign, add signers and place fields as you would for any Certyneo envelope. When sending, choose "Qualified (QES)" in the signature level.
The signatory is redirected to our partner QTSP (itsme in Belgium, Evrotrust for other EU countries) for video identity verification + identity document. First time only — subsequent signatures reuse the certificate.
The QTSP issues the qualified certificate, calculates the cryptographic signature (PAdES-LTA), and seals it in the PDF. The operation takes a few seconds on the server side, transparent to the signatory.
The signed PDF is archived for 10 years in the Certyneo vault, exportable at any time with its complete audit trail. The signature is billed at €9.90 on your end-of-month Stripe invoice.
The three eIDAS levels meet different evidentiary strength needs. Here is a reference table to calibrate the level to your act's risk.
| Criterion | SES — Simple | AES — Advanced | QES — Qualified |
|---|---|---|---|
| Signatory authentication | Click or checkbox | Double OTP email + SMS | Qualified certificate issued by QTSP after identity verification |
| Evidentiary value | Contractual basis | Strong — presumption art. 1367 Civil Code | Maximum — equivalent to manuscript EU-wide (art. 25(2)) |
| Typical use case | ToS, quotes, acknowledgments | HR contracts, NDA, mandates, leases | Notarial deeds, INPI, public tenders, M&A |
| Certyneo pricing | Included in all plans | Included from Personal plan (€9/month) | €9.90/signature per act — from Standard plan |
| Available on Certyneo | Yes — all plans | Yes — from Personal plan | Yes — from Standard plan, per act |
Yes. Certyneo QES goes through a qualified trust service provider (itsme in Belgium, Evrotrust for other EU countries) listed on the European trust list published by the Commission. The certificate issued is uniformly recognized in all 27 Member States under article 25(2) of eIDAS. The signature produced is strictly equivalent to that of any other QTSP on the list.
The marginal cost of a qualified signature comes from the partner QTSP — each signature consumes a certificate, an identity verification, and a cryptographic operation on their infrastructure. Rather than passing this cost into a flat monthly subscription (which disadvantages occasional use), we bill per usage. You only pay for QES in months you use it, and only for the volume actually signed. Beyond 100 signatures/month, a negotiated volume rate is available in the Enterprise contract.
For the first signature only, the signatory must install the Evrotrust app (iOS or Android) or authenticate via itsme if in Belgium. Identity verification takes about 3 minutes — identity document + video selfie. Once the certificate is issued, all subsequent QES signatures are affixed in less than a minute, without new verification. The certificate is stored on the signatory's phone and remains valid for several years.
No — QES is available from Standard plan (€19/month) onward. On Free and Personal plans, QES is not enabled on the server side; you must first upgrade to Standard plan to be able to select "Qualified (QES)" in the send wizard. The cost of QES (€9.90/signature) is added to your Standard, Business or Business Pro subscription and appears on your end-of-month Stripe invoice.
Yes. Certyneo QES uses the PAdES-LTA format (PDF Advanced Electronic Signatures — Long Term Availability) defined by ETSI EN 319 142 standards. The qualified certificate, qualified timestamp, and all validation information are embedded in the PDF itself, allowing the signature to be verified for 10 years even if the QTSP closes in the meantime. Adobe Reader, INPI/RBE/court verifiers, and public procurement portals recognize this format natively.
The cost of €9.90/signature only applies to a QES signature actually affixed to a document. You can prepare an envelope, send it to the signatory and sign it in QES — billing is triggered when the QTSP validates the signature, not before. If you want to test the signatory journey without validating, choose the AES level (included in your subscription) to familiarize yourself with the interface, then switch to QES for your actual acts.
Within the EU and EEA (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway), eIDAS QES is legally recognized in all Member States. Outside the EU (United States, United Kingdom, Switzerland, Canada, etc.), recognition depends on bilateral agreements and the law of the destination country. Switzerland and the United Kingdom have equivalent frameworks (ZertES, eIDAS-UK) with partial mutual recognition agreements. For an act intended for a third country, consult an international lawyer to confirm local recognition.
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