How your clients sign in to the portal
A client opens the portal, types the phone number or email you have for them, and is sent a one-time link. There is no password and no invite to send.
The client asks for their own link
There is no invite button in the office and no password to set up. The client asks for their own link, and these are the steps to walk one through on the phone.
- Open the portal sign-in page, /portal.It is in English or Spanish, and the language switch is on the page before anybody signs in.
- Type the phone number or the email address you have on their record.One field takes either. The only thing it refuses is something shaped like neither a phone number nor an email address.
- Press Send me a link, then tap the link that arrives.It works once and lapses after a few minutes, and both the page and the message say how many. A lapsed link brings them back to the same page to ask for another.
What arrives, and when nothing does
What they typed decides where the link goes. An email address gets an email. A phone number gets a text, and where a text cannot go out, because texting is not live yet or that number replied STOP, the link goes to the email on the record instead, if there is one. A client who texted STOP gets no texts from you, and the sign-in link is no exception.
The page gives the same answer whether or not what they typed is on file, and it does not say when it has stopped sending links because somebody asked too often. That is deliberate: otherwise the form would tell a stranger which of your clients exist. It also means the page cannot tell you why nothing came, so check the phone number and the email on their customer record first.
A customer needs at least one of the two to be reached at all, and the customer form refuses to save one with neither. Whichever you hold has to be the one they type: a client who types a work email when you have their home phone is told a link is on its way and receives nothing.
People on the account
A link belongs to a person, not to the account. Add the manager, the board member or the tenant as contacts on the customer, each with their own phone number or email, and each signs in as themselves. A contact’s role is one of Primary contact, Billing contact, Property manager, HOA board or Tenant.
What they see follows the role. A tenant sees the schedule and can ask for things, but does not see the payment section and cannot act on a quote or a payment. The other roles can.
What a client sees once they are in
The portal opens on Home, with Calendar, Properties and Account beside it. Home is one long page with a row of shortcuts across the top, and it lists only the sections that have something in them:
- Next visit and Visits — what is coming up and what has been done.
- Properties — each property opens to its own page, with a map, a property passport that prints and, once you have shared a design with them, that design.
- Quotes and Change orders — what is waiting for an answer. A client accepts a quote on its own page.
- Payment and Receipts — open invoices and what has been paid, a card on file and automatic payment. Card payments appear once you have connected Stripe.
- Requests — skip a visit, pause service for a while, a changed gate code, different preferred days, or a quote. Each goes to your Review queue; nothing changes on the board by itself.
- Messages — a way to write to your office, which lands in your Inbox.
- Account — their contact details, which notices they receive, the documents you have shared with them, and a way to invite a neighbor.