Section 101.1030  Form of Electronic Documents for Filing

a)         In addition to complying with the formatting requirements of Section 101.302(g) and (j), electronic documents uploaded on COOL for filing must be in one of the following electronic formats:

1)         Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF), version 2.0 or greater;

2)         Microsoft Word for Windows, version 6.0 or greater;

3)         Corel WordPerfect for Windows, version 6.0 or greater; or

4)         Microsoft Excel for Windows, version 4.0 or greater.

b)         Generally, electronic documents filed in compliance with this Subpart will be posted to COOL by the Clerk's Office in text-searchable Adobe PDF.  When practicable, persons should: 

1)         Upload their electronic documents on COOL in text-searchable Adobe PDF; and 

2)         Convert their electronic documents to a text-searchable Adobe PDF directly from the program used to create the document, rather than from a scanned image of the paper document. 

c)         No single electronic file uploaded on COOL, whether constituting all or part of an electronic document, may contain more than 10 megabytes (MB) of data.  To comply with this requirement, an electronic document may be divided into parts and submitted as multiple electronic files, each file being 10 MB or less.  The person authorizing the filing is responsible for dividing the document into appropriately-sized files and naming each file to reflect its place within the electronic document. 

d)         Multiple electronic documents, whether for the same proceeding or different proceedings, must be uploaded separately on COOL and, therefore, must not be combined into a single electronic file for filing through COOL.

e)         Electronic documents may contain links to material external to the filed document.  However, links to external material are for convenience purposes only.  The external material behind the link is not considered part of the filing or the record of the proceeding in which the document was filed.

f)         All documents uploaded on COOL must be free of viruses or other harmful processes.  If an electronic document containing a virus or other harmful process is uploaded on COOL, the Board may, consistent with Section 101.800(b) and (c), impose sanctions, including barring the document from being filed in any manner and barring the person authorizing the filing or the digital signature certificate holder from any further electronic filing through COOL. 

g)         Documents filed under Section 101.302(h)(2) must:

1)         Include bookmarks, immediately viewable when the document is opened, to individual documents in the same order as they appear in the corresponding Table of Contents to facilitate navigation and location of specific contents within the document; and

2)         Have pagination displayed on each document in the top right corner of each page.

(Source:  Amended at 43 Ill. Reg. 9674, effective August 22, 2019)