Publish a TermsFeed AutoTerms legal page from the classic WordPress editor once you have read the draft the questionnaire created. The draft holds the full generated text, and visitors see none of it until you click Publish.

How to review and publish a new legal page

Review and publish a new legal page in 5 steps and about 10 minutes. You need the draft that Create opened, or its row in TermsFeed > All Legal Pages.

  1. Open TermsFeed > All Legal Pages and click the title of the draft. The page opens in the classic editor, without the questionnaire.
  2. Read the text from the "Last updated" line to the end, and correct anything that does not match your business. Keep each [wpautoterms ...] shortcode as it is, because it prints a detail from the settings or the date of the last save.
  3. Review the boxes around the text: Excerpt, Page Attributes (Parent, Template, Order), Author, Categories, and Custom Fields. Open Screen Options at the top of the screen to show a box that is hidden.
  4. Click Publish in the Publish box.
  5. Open TermsFeed > All Legal Pages to confirm the result. The row shows the status publish, the shortcode of the page, and a Last Effective Date, and its permalink sits above the row actions. Close every private window and open that permalink in a new one to see the page as a visitor sees it.

The classic editor of a draft Privacy Policy with the Last updated line at the top of the text, and the Publish and Page Attributes boxes marked

TermsFeed > All Legal Pages lists every legal page, and its Status column tells you whether a page is live. Other WordPress lists print a "Draft" or "Private" label after the title, but this list leaves the label out. Read the status, the shortcode, and the dates of each page in these columns.

Column What it shows Sortable
Title The title of the legal page Yes
Status The status of the page as WordPress names it, such as publish or draft No
Shortcode [wpautoterms page="<slug>"] for a published page, with the path parent/child for a child page; "N/A" with the hint "Publish page to get shortcode." otherwise Yes, by slug
Last Effective Date The date of the last save, in the site date format, for published pages only Yes
Date The date WordPress shows on every list: the publish date, or the last change of a draft Yes

Copy the shortcode from the Shortcode column into a post to embed the whole page there.

The All Legal Pages list with a published Privacy Policy marked, showing its permalink, Shortcode column, and Last Effective Date

Which legal page details update themselves and which stay fixed

The shortcodes in a legal page print their current value each time WordPress builds the page, and the rest of the text stays as it was generated. A cached copy of the page keeps the old value until you clear your page cache. Which details are shortcodes and which are plain text decides what you edit by hand after a change in your business.

These details change without an edit to the page.

  • Website name and URL. The page prints them through [wpautoterms site_name] and [wpautoterms site_url] wherever your answer equaled General Settings or was left blank.
  • Shortcodes you add. Every [wpautoterms] shortcode you type into the page prints its current value.
  • The "Last updated" date. The line at the top prints it through [wpautoterms last_updated_date].
  • Links to the page. The footer legal links, the menu items added from the Legal Pages box, and the widgets follow the page permalink, including a new slug.

The company name and address, the country and state, the contact details, and every section an answer added are plain text. A later change in General Settings leaves them as they are, so edit them in the page.

How to change your questionnaire answers after the legal page exists

The plugin does not keep questionnaire answers, so change a generated page by editing its text or by creating a new page. Edit the text in the editor for a small change, such as a new contact email or a section to remove. A change that adds or removes several sections, such as GDPR wording, needs a new page from the questionnaire.

Copy the text of the new page into the old one, so the old page keeps its address and its post ID. Menu items, the Privacy Policy page in Settings > Privacy, and the WooCommerce terms page point to a page by that ID, so they keep working.

  1. Create the new page from TermsFeed > Add Legal Page. The new page opens as a draft.
  2. Select the "Text" tab of the editor, select all the content of the draft, and copy it.
  3. Open the old page from TermsFeed > All Legal Pages, select its "Text" tab, replace its content with the copied text, and click the "Update" button.
  4. Move the draft to the Trash from its row in TermsFeed > All Legal Pages.
  5. Clear your page cache. Close every private window, open the old page in a new one, and check that it shows the new sections and the current date in its "Last updated" line.

To swap pages instead, move the old page to the Trash before you publish the new one, so the new page takes the slug of the type, such as privacy-policy. Published while the old page is still live, the new page gets privacy-policy-2. Shortcodes find a page by its slug, so they follow the new page. The footer legal links of the Links to Legal Pages kit list every published legal page, so they follow the new page too. Every selection made by ID still points to the trashed page, so repair each one after the swap.

  1. Move the old page to the Trash from its row in TermsFeed > All Legal Pages.
  2. Open the new draft you created from TermsFeed > Add Legal Page, in TermsFeed > All Legal Pages, and click Publish in the Publish box.
  3. Replace the menu item of the old page with the new page in Appearance > Menus, and click the "Save Menu" button. A custom link to the page address, such as a link in a Navigation block, keeps working, because the new page takes the same slug.
  4. Choose the new page again on each screen that asked for a legal page, and save it. Click the "Use This Page" button in Settings > Privacy and the "Publish" button in Appearance > Customize > WooCommerce > Checkout. Click the save button of every other plugin that asked for one too. A store with the Checkout block, where WooCommerce grays out the Customizer Checkout section, needs the command in How to choose legal pages in WooCommerce.
  5. Drag the new page into place in the "Links Order" list of the Links to Legal Pages kit, and save. A legal page published after you saved an order joins the end of the row.
  6. Clear your page cache, because cached pages still link to the trashed page. Close every private window, open your WordPress website in a new one, and click the menu link and the footer legal link. On a WooCommerce store, add a product to the cart, open the checkout, and click its terms link. Each link opens the new page.

How "Last updated" and "Last Effective Date" follow every save

The "Last updated" line of the page and the Last Effective Date column both show the date of the last save, so every save moves them. A typo fix moves the date as much as a new section does.

The date uses the date format and the time zone set in Settings > General, and the month names follow the site language. An English legal page on a French WordPress site therefore shows a French month. The Update Notices kit announces a change by that date too, unless the save came within 60 seconds of publishing.

How to tell visitors that a legal page changed

Turn on the Update Notices of Legal Pages kit to show a bar about legal pages you edited recently. The bar names each changed page with a link and the date of the change. Each visitor closes the bar with its "Close" link.

Edit the page first, then let the kit announce the change for the period you choose. Set up the bar, its messages, and its period with Announce Legal Page Updates in WordPress.

How to restore an earlier version of a legal page from "Revisions"

WordPress keeps a revision of a legal page at every save that changes the title, content, or excerpt. Restore any revision from the Revisions screen, which opens from the page editor.

  1. Open the page in the editor and click Browse next to "Revisions" in the Publish box.
  2. Move the slider to the version you want and compare it with the current text.
  3. Click Restore This Revision. Restoring counts as a save, so the "Last updated" date moves to the day you restore.

How to change the slug, parent, order, and template of a legal page

Change the slug, the parent, the order, and the template of a legal page in the editor, as for a WordPress page. Each change takes effect when you click Update.

  • Slug. Click Edit next to the permalink under the title. The page address changes with the slug.
  • Parent. Choose another legal page in Page Attributes > Parent. The child page moves under the address of its parent, such as /termsfeed/policies/privacy-policy/.
  • Order. Type a number in Page Attributes > Order. The Legal Pages widget uses the order while its "Sort by:" field reads "Page order".
  • Template. Choose a page template from your theme in Page Attributes > Template. Pick the template for each page with How to choose a page template for a legal page.

WordPress redirects the old address of a renamed post, but it does not add a redirect for a legal page, and neither does the plugin. A new slug leaves every link you typed by hand pointing to the old address, such as a custom menu link or a link in a post. Shortcodes that name the old slug do not find a page. Update those links and shortcodes, such as [wpautoterms page="privacy-policy"], in the same session.

Administrators, Super Admins on a multisite network, and users with a role the plugin adds create, edit, publish, and delete legal pages. An Editor or an Author without those roles does not see the TermsFeed menu.

The plugin adds "WPAutoTerms Pages Editor (additional)", and "Editor + WPAutoTerms Pages Editor" on sites that have the Editor role. The second role gives an Editor the capabilities the Editor role held when the plugin created the role, plus the legal pages. Compare every capability of these roles in TermsFeed AutoTerms Capabilities and Roles.

Give an Editor the role "Editor + WPAutoTerms Pages Editor" on the user profile screen, in 3 steps and about 1 minute. On a single site the Editor role holds unfiltered_html, so this user opens Compliance Kits and Settings too. The kit fields on Compliance Kits print scripts, CSS, and HTML on every page of your WordPress website. On a multisite network the same role opens the legal pages only.

  1. Open Users in your WordPress admin and click the name of the Editor.
  2. Choose "Editor + WPAutoTerms Pages Editor" in the "Role" select and click the "Update User" button.
  3. Close every private window, open a new one, and log in as that user. Confirm that the TermsFeed menu shows All Legal Pages and Add Legal Page, and, on a single site, Compliance Kits and Settings.

A user who keeps another main role, such as Author, gets the legal pages from "WPAutoTerms Pages Editor (additional)" as a second role. The profile screen offers a single role, so add the second role with a role editor plugin, or have a developer run these WP-CLI commands, replacing jane with the user login. The second command prints every role the user holds, manage_wpautoterms_pages included.

wp user add-role jane manage_wpautoterms_pages
wp user get jane --field=roles

Give the additional role only beside a main role. Alone, the additional role does not hold the read capability, so WordPress sends the user to the home page after login.

How to unpublish or delete a legal page

Switch a legal page to Draft or move it to the Trash to take it off the website. Unpublish it from the Publish box in the editor.

  1. Click Edit next to "Status" in the Publish box.
  2. Choose Draft.
  3. Click Update.
  4. Clear the page cache of your caching plugin, because a cached page keeps showing the page and its footer legal link.

Delete the page instead with Move to Trash in the Publish box, or Trash in the page row, then clear the page cache. Once the page is no longer published, the plugin removes it from these places on your WordPress website.

  • footer legal links. The Links to Legal Pages kit drops the page, because it lists published legal pages only.
  • Shortcodes. Every shortcode that names the page slug prints nothing, and a page shortcode embeds nothing.
  • Widgets. The Legal Pages widget drops the page from its list.
  • Update Notices. The kit stops announcing the page.

Custom links to the page address, in a menu or a Navigation block, stay and lead to a missing page, so remove them by hand.

A page in the Trash stays restorable until you delete it permanently from the Trash view of All Legal Pages. WordPress empties the Trash on its own after 30 days by default. Deleting the plugin keeps every legal page unless wp-config.php defines WPAUTOTERMS_UNINSTALL_DELETE_PAGES as true. Read what removing the plugin deletes in Install the TermsFeed AutoTerms Plugin on WordPress.