Anonymous Suggestion Box Online with a QR Code

Some things people will not say to the manager's face: the shift lead who snaps at new staff, the back door lock that has been broken for a month, an idea that sounds silly out loud. A paper suggestion box asks them to trust that nobody knows their handwriting. An online anonymous suggestion box, which is an anonymous feedback form with its own link and a QR code on the wall, is there when the thought comes. People write without a name, and you read each entry in Telegram as soon as it is sent.

With an Easy Post web form you will not know who wrote, so you cannot answer one person in private, and the box has no statistics or charts. The same form also has a second way in, through a Telegram bot, and the bot shows you the sender's name. This guide keeps everyone on the web page.

If your team reads email rather than Telegram, a Google Form does the same job. Turn off email collection, leave "Limit to 1 response" off because it makes people sign in with Google, and switch on email notifications for new responses. The Google Forms comparison covers the other differences.

Where to start

You set everything up on the easy-post.app website. Sign in with Google. The first screen, "What do you want to receive?", has no task for a suggestion box: under the tasks, next to "Don't see your task?", press "pick from all ready-made forms" and choose the Q&A / Anonymous Questions template. Easy Post opens the pipeline page. A pipeline is your form together with the entries it collects. At the top there is a yellow "Still to do" panel, and below it a block called "Where people send submissions". The Submissions button at the top of the page opens the list of everything people sent.

In the yellow panel, press "Test the form in Telegram". Telegram opens with the Easy Post bot; press Start. The bot confirms that your Telegram is linked, then sends the form's welcome message with a Start button (on some plans with a "Powered by Easy Post" line). Press that button, and the questions begin. Answer them all as a test: a Telegram message with your answers arrives in the same chat, and the pipeline page updates itself to say "The form works". The bot also asks "Post anonymously?", and even if you answer "Yes, anonymous", the message shows your name. That is expected: the test went through the bot, and it is the reason you will give people the web page instead. If Telegram is not installed on your computer, do this step from the pipeline page on your phone.

Skip the item "Add a channel if you want to publish". It is marked Optional, and the box needs no channel. If you already have an account, the "+ New pipeline" button on your project page opens the same list of templates, if your plan has room for another pipeline.

Try the suggestion box template →

Three Telegrams in this setup, and the one link to share

The word Telegram turns up three times while you set this up, and only one link is safe to give people.

• Your own Telegram gets a message for every entry. You linked it with "Test the form in Telegram".
• The Easy Post bot runs the same form, and an entry sent through it shows you the sender's Telegram name and @username. The bot is always on and cannot be switched off, so never share its link.
• The page people see after pressing Send has a button "Find out the result in Telegram". If someone presses it and then Start, their Telegram account is tied to their entry, and their name appears next to it under Submissions. You cannot remove the button. In this setup it only brings a promise from the bot that it will send the result, and that message never comes, because nothing here sends a result. The texts below ask people to skip it.

One rule keeps people on the web page: take the link only from the "Web form" card, with its "Copy link" or "Download QR code". The other buttons that copy or send a link give the bot: "Open bot", "Copy link" and "Copy announcement" on the "Telegram bot" card, and "Send in Telegram" and "Copy link" in the yellow panel after your test. The yellow panel also has a button "Copy the web form link", which copies the right link, but you do not need it.

That card, in "Where people send submissions", should already say "On · taking submissions": a pipeline made from the first screen starts with the form on. If it says "Switched off" (a pipeline made with "+ New pipeline"), press its switch; it saves at once. The card then shows "Link to the form" with "Copy link" and "Open the form". Open the folded "QR code" section and press "Download QR code": you get an SVG file, which stays sharp at any print size. If your printer cannot open it, take a screenshot of the QR code on the page and print that.

Illustration: the texts are the site's own; the Telegram bot card next to it is left out.

An entry from the web page carries no name, no Telegram account and no IP address. Easy Post stores the language of the page and the time it was sent. The page uses the sender's internet address only to count how many entries come from one connection in a minute, and does not save it with the entry. Before accepting an entry, the page also runs a robot check by Cloudflare, which at most asks people to tick a box.

Turn the template into an anonymous suggestion box

The template gives two things the same name, "Q&A / Anonymous Questions", and you rename both. The pipeline name heads every Telegram message you get ("New submission in" and the name). The form name is the heading of the web page people see. Start with the pipeline: press Edit at the top of the pipeline page, change "Pipeline Name" to "Suggestion box" and press "Update Pipeline". The site then opens your project page, not the pipeline: press "Suggestion box" there to get back. The form name comes in the table below.

Then press the Form button at the top of the pipeline page. Each question there is a card with a "Field name, shown only to you" box (the label on your Telegram message), a Type menu, a "Bot prompt" box (the question people read, on the web page too) and a × in the corner that deletes the question. For a Buttons question, type the button names into the box under the prompt, separated by commas.

Press Save before you leave the page. There are two Save buttons, one under the Post Template box and one under "Submission Settings" further down, and either one saves the questions and the texts. Further down still, the "Web form" box has a third Save that saves only its list of sites, not the questions or texts.

A contact question helps when customers or tenants may want a personal answer. Press "+ Add Field" and make a Text question: field name "Contact", prompt "Want a personal answer? Leave an email or phone. Leave it empty to stay anonymous." A new question starts optional and goes to the end, which suits it. Fill in the "Field name, shown only to you" box, or the form will not save, and keep the Text type, because the Phone type refuses an email address. In a team where people are afraid of being found out, leave this question out: a box asking for a phone number can make the whole form look less anonymous.

Write what people read before and after

Scroll down the same page to "Bot Messages". The bot shows these two texts too, so they do not promise anonymity themselves. The promise goes on the poster, which carries only the web page.

The "Welcome Text" appears on the web page under the heading. Its default, "Welcome! Press the button to submit your entry.", talks about a button the page does not have, so replace it:

Something to fix, an idea, a complaint? Write it here. We answer everything in the team chat on the first Monday of each month.

The "Completion Text" appears on the page people see after pressing Send, right above the Telegram button:

Thank you, we have it. Look for our answer in the team chat on the first Monday of the month. If a "Find out the result in Telegram" button appears below, skip it: it links your Telegram account to this message.

Under your text the page adds its own line, "Want to know when it is reviewed? Open the bot and press Start: it will message you the result." You cannot change it, which is why your text asks people to skip the button just before they see it.

If you added the Contact question, start the second sentence with "If you left a contact, we will answer you there; otherwise look for our answer…". Put your own day and place in both texts, promise only a day you will keep, and press Save under "Submission Settings".

Illustration: the completion text is the one you write; the rest is the page's own.

Put the QR code where people think of it

Print the downloaded QR code with a line under it. This is the only place that promises anonymity, so it carries only the web page's code:

Suggestion box. Something to fix, an idea, a complaint? Scan the code: the form does not ask your name or send it to us. After sending, skip the Telegram button. Answers: team chat, first Monday of the month.

For staff, hang it in the staff room or next to the time clock, and pin the web page link in the team chat or, if there is no shared chat, on the notice board next to the code. Opening the link from a Telegram chat changes nothing: the web page reads nothing from Telegram, so it does not learn who opened it. For tenants, use the lobby notice board. Customer star ratings fit a CSAT survey in Telegram better, and a tenant reporting a leak needs a reply, which is a job for a maintenance request form.

Anyone who walks past a code on a wall can write, so for a staff-only box keep it in rooms only staff use. The daily and monthly limits per person in the form settings work only in the bot. The web page has its own cap: 10 entries a minute from one connection and 120 an hour for the whole form. People on one Wi-Fi network usually share a connection, so if a group sends at the same moment, the eleventh person is asked to wait up to a minute, and what they typed stays in the form.

Build your anonymous form →

Read the entries and answer everyone at once

Each entry reaches your Telegram as a message from the bot. It starts with "New submission in Suggestion box", then "Saved in your dashboard" (the dashboard is your Submissions list) and the answers. Where an entry from the bot would say "From:" and a name, this one says "🌐 Sent through the web form". There are no buttons, because nothing waits for your decision.

Illustration: the texts are the bot's own, and the field names are the ones you set; names and data are made up.

To share the reading, for example with HR, open your project page (the project name at the top of the pipeline page), press Members and invite that person by the email of their Easy Post account. They get the messages once they link their own Telegram on the pipeline page: with "Test the form in Telegram" in the yellow panel, or with "Link Telegram Account" in the "Get instant notifications" box. The same button is in their Profile. Every member can see and delete entries and edit the form, because there is no read-only role. So do not add the people the box may be about, such as a shift lead or a head chef.

To remove a rude entry, press Delete next to it under Submissions. It moves to the Deleted tab, where members still see it, and the Telegram message stays.

Then answer on the day you promised, in one post in the team chat. Give each entry one line, in your own words, and say what you will do or why you will not. Retelling hides the writer's turn of phrase.

Where it gets stuck

• Every entry shows when it was sent. On a late shift with two people, the time can point to one of them. Say so when you launch, for example: "Entries show the time they were sent. Write whenever it suits you." And do not add questions such as department or shift: in a small team they name the writer.
• Link your Telegram ("Test the form in Telegram") before you test the web page. A web test sent before that never reaches your Telegram. After linking, a web test closes the yellow panel, because an entry from the web page counts as someone else's even when you sent it. You lose only the panel's tips: the links and the QR code stay in "Where people send submissions".
• Your test entries stay under Submissions. Delete them before launch if you want a clean list.
• Submissions has no export to a file, so copy anything you want to keep elsewhere.

Set it up in five steps

1. Sign in, on the first screen choose "pick from all ready-made forms", then "Q&A / Anonymous Questions", press "Test the form in Telegram", press Start in the bot, then Start again under its welcome message, and answer the form once. Skip the channel.
2. Press Edit, rename the pipeline "Suggestion box" and press "Update Pipeline". On the project page that opens, press "Suggestion box" to get back to the pipeline.
3. Press Form: rename the form, change Topic and Question, delete "Anonymous?" and its line in the Post Template, paste the two texts under "Bot Messages", and press Save under "Submission Settings".
4. Check that the "Web form" card says "On · taking submissions" (if not, press its switch), press "Open the form", send one test entry and check that it reaches Telegram with "Sent through the web form". Then delete your test entries under Submissions, including the bot test with your name.
5. On the "Web form" card, press "Copy link", open "QR code" and press "Download QR code". Print the code with the poster line, pin the link where your team reads, tell the team that entries show the time they were sent, and put your answer day in the calendar.

New to Telegram bots? How to create a Telegram bot without code explains the basics; this setup needs no bot of your own.

Set up your suggestion box →