Submittable is suitable for users, not so suitable for staff.
September 14, 2022
Submittable is suitable for users, not so suitable for staff.
Score 4 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Submittable
We use Submittable to manage our grant programs. Our staff has built out grant applications in the system, manages reviewers as they score applications within the system, and then also run reports and export data after all applications and reviews have been received. This platform is supposed to create a smooth process for grant administration and cut down on staff time processing applications.
- Submittable is mostly user-friendly for applicants, and the application process goes smoothly. It is easy to set up an account and start applications, and the application forms are easy to read and fill out.
- Submittable is user-friendly for reviewers. It is easy for volunteers or staff members to access all applications and submit their scores on the platform.
- The ability to use internal forms makes due diligence processes or other internal reviews easy for staff to complete. It's helpful that these reviews can be automatically assigned upon submission and that they are easily accessed while reading through forms.
- Advanced reporting is far from advanced. There are SO many limitations and the need to manually do so many things in order to get the report structure you want, and it is not intuitive. The reporting is by far the most frustrating thing about Submittable and actually adds on staff time instead of cutting it down.
- PDFs of submissions should include all supplemental files uploaded in the submission. You should not have to do massive exports with zip files and then merge everything manually to get one PDF of submitted content for simplified records or sharing.
- We should be able to see the account emails and names of individuals who have started a draft submission. In our former system (GIFTS online via Blackbaud), we could see that information and could reach out personally to applicants to ensure they didn't miss deadlines and could remove emails from our reminder communications from those we knew already submitted and simply opened up an accidental additional draft. When we send reminders in Submittable to draft submissions, without fail, we get 5-10 people who reach out and are upset because they already submitted but think this means they didn't, regardless of how we word the email and tell them they may have an extra draft if they think they already submitted.
- You should be able to simply build one report in whatever format you need and be able to switch between different projects that use the same exact form fields. My team has the same exact form used for nine different grant programs because they are the same programs, just for different local communities, but we have to build out the same report manually each cycle for each community.
- Improved applicant experience.
- Negative impact on staff time spent packaging applications at the end of a grant cycle.
- Negative impact on staff time spent opening up applications for editing, rather than being able to make small edits for typos, etc.
Submittable has neither helped nor hindered our ability to build stronger relationships with our grantees. In some ways, we communicate with grantees more during the application process because we have to contact so many of them to open their applications up for editing because of mistakes on their applications. But this isn't necessarily how we want to spend our time building relationships with our grantees.
Do you think Submittable delivers good value for the price?
Not sure
Are you happy with Submittable's feature set?
No
Did Submittable live up to sales and marketing promises?
I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process
Did implementation of Submittable go as expected?
I wasn't involved with the implementation phase
Would you buy Submittable again?
No