With SurveyMethods, you can choose whether your respondents can respond to your survey once or more than once, as well as control whether they can save a custom URL to resume their survey later.
Allow Single/Multiple Responses
When you launch your survey, regardless of whether you choose email launch or web URL launch, you will be asked to choose whether your respondents can complete the survey once each or whether they can complete the survey more than once.
If you choose to allow multiple responses per respondent, the system will accept unlimited responses from each respondent and/or computer. The system will also not automatically save a respondent’s progress if they close out of the survey and re-launch using the survey web URL. If you would like to allow multiple responses and also allow users to save their progress, be sure to activate the Save & Resume feature.
The survey launch method will determine how this setting is applied.
Email Launch
If you launch your survey by email, each respondent will receive an email with a unique URL to complete the survey. If you choose “Allow each respondent to take this survey only once”, each unique URL can be used only once to submit a survey response. Once a response has been submitted for that URL, respondents who click the link will see a message that the survey can only be completed once and has already been submitted (the exact message can be customized using the Language Packs feature). Note that with an email launch, a respondent’s answers will automatically be saved while he or she completes the survey, and accessing the survey using the custom URL will return the respondent to where they left off.
Web URL Launch
If you are launching using the web URL and choose “Allow each respondent to take this survey only once”, SurveyMethods will use cookies to ensure that only one response is received per computer. The system also tracks IP addresses and only allows one response per IP address in case a user attempts to use a different browser to submit another response.
Note: If using web URL launch with single response per respondent, the survey can be taken more than once if a respondent deletes the cookies from their browser or accesses the survey with a different browser or computer. To prevent this method of bypassing the restriction you would need to use email launch or the Web Launch – Single Take per Unique Value feature.
Activate Save & Resume
If you want to allow respondents to save their progress to return later, SurveyMethods has a feature called Save & Resume. You can activate this feature when launching your survey or from the survey settings menu.
When this setting is checked, respondents will see a button on the bottom of each survey page titled Save and Resume Later (the name of the button can be customized in the survey Language Pack).
If the respondent clicks on that button, they will be given a custom URL that they can copy and paste into another document (such as Microsoft Word) that can be used to return to the survey at their convenience with their previous answers saved.
The instructions for save and resume can also be customized from the survey language pack.
Note: If you launch your survey by email, the survey will automatically save a respondent’s progress each time they go to the next page. If they use the URL from their launch email to revisit their survey, they will automatically be taken to where they last left off.