Capture a conditional public inquiry

Public inquiry forms create an inquiry with a retained copy of the questions and accepted answers. They are useful for first contact: a portrait request, a wedding inquiry or a vendor service enquiry. Personal questionnaires remain a separate flow for an existing inquiry.

Build a conditional portrait inquiry

Open Forms & questionnaires, then Create a form. Choose Public inquiry → new lead, select your project type and keep an always-visible, required name and email question. Give each question a stable field key. An email question records what the visitor entered; it does not verify ownership of that address or grant email/SMS marketing permission.

For example, add Portrait setting, a required choice with Outdoors and Studio. After it, add Outdoor location and travel details, make it required and set its condition to show when Portrait setting equals Outdoors. A question can depend only on an earlier question. Use the interactive preview to test both choices.

An outdoor visitor must supply travel details. A studio visitor does not see that question and can submit without it. The server discards answers to hidden or unknown questions, including a travel answer left behind when a visitor changes from Outdoors to Studio. It validates the visible answers again before saving.

Save the draft, then choose Publish saved draft. Draft changes remain private. The public link shows the latest published version; existing personal requests keep their own saved questions.

Share and receive inquiries

Choose Open public form and copy that page’s address. Add it as a link or button on your website or send it to someone who wants to enquire. This flow provides a hosted form link; there is no separate iframe embed setup in this release.

Each newly accepted public submission creates one inquiry and one retained response. Name and email map to the primary contact; other mapped fields populate the supported inquiry details. Custom answers retain their field keys and the published form’s project type. Matching names or email addresses do not silently merge new submissions into an existing client.

If the browser cannot confirm a response, keep it open and choose Retry these answers. The retry uses the same request and accepted answers, so it cannot create another inquiry. Changing an accepted answer under the same request is rejected. Refreshing or starting a separate submission creates a new request; it is not the same recovery operation. Public inquiries do not have cross-device saved progress.

If a new version was published before an unsubmitted page was sent, refresh to review the current questions. An already accepted exact retry can still return its original receipt while the form remains open. Close form makes its public page and further submissions unavailable, including retries; existing private response history stays accessible. Reopening restores the latest published public page.

Read the original source

The form’s Responses list shows the original public heading, publication revision, time received, question labels and accepted answers. Open the inquiry record to find Original inquiry source, or expand Original source details and choose Open this retained response for its permanent private link. Both lists are paginated.

For example, Inez submits “North garden entrance; allow ten minutes for the step-free route” under Outdoor location and travel details. You later rename the question to Meeting point and travel arrangements and publish again. Inez’s response still shows the original wording and publication revision. Editing the inquiry’s current name or notes also leaves that response unchanged.

Publication and answer hashes are checked before displaying the source. Older publications without a stored definition hash are labelled as legacy retained publications. A missing or damaged publication never borrows labels from the current draft. Current workspace permissions apply on every read; other businesses and limited shared-wedding participants cannot read these responses.

The response’s lead link opens its original private record, including an archived or explicitly merged original. Source history is not reassigned to a continuing record. Personal questionnaire corrections use their separate reviewed mapping controls; showing an original source does not apply its answers again.

What the source establishes

This source establishes which form publication received these answers and which inquiry it created. It does not prove email ownership, identify an advertising campaign or referral source, import marketplace messages, confirm a booking, or record a payment. Email, SMS and payment provider activation are unnecessary for capturing and reviewing these public inquiries.