A vWork-hosted Customer Portal is a branded self-service website tailored for your business that enables your customers to book and track their own jobs in vWork with ease.

The Customer Portal is an optional feature in vWork. You can get an overview of what it is in the article, What is the Customer Portal?  To find out more or discuss your needs with one of the vWork team please email us at support@vworkapp.com. We'll be in touch to discuss your requirements.

In this article

This article guides you through linking Customers to Portal Users and customizing individual Portal User Permissions.

💡 Tip: We have another article, Sign up and activate a Portal User, that explains how to create and activate Portal Users so they can use your Customer Portal. 

Topics in this article include:

• Customize the templates a Portal User can access
• Portal Users and Customers - what’s the difference?
• When does a Portal User automatically create a new Customer in vWork?
• Link a Portal User to an existing Customer in vWork
• Customize Portal User permissions used to manage a customer’s jobs
• Unlink a Customer from a Portal User
• Related articles

Click a topic from the list above to go to that topic. You can return to this list by clicking this icon:

Customize the templates a Portal User can access

All Portal Users have access to the default templates added in the Portal Settings. These are used to filter the jobs they see through the Customer Portal and specify the types of jobs they can create. 

You can customize any individual Portal User’s access to templates in three different ways:  

• Add templates
• Remove templates
• Edit template permissions.

Portal Users have their template permissions customized in the 'Templates' section of their Portal User’s profile by a vWork Admin. 

Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users and either:

• Click to open an existing Portal User’s profile, or
• Click to add a new Portal User.

Add additional templates to a Portal User

Add additional templates that a Portal User can use to create jobs through the Customer Portal.

1. Click to select the template you want to add then click .
   
   
2. You can then update the template permissions that apply for all Portal Users of this template.
   
   
   
   
3. Make sure you click when you are done updating the available templates for the selected Portal User.

Remove individual templates

Remove individual templates from this Portal User’s profile and reduce the jobs they have access to through the Customer Portal.

1. Click next to the template you want to remove from the Portal User's profile.
   💡 Tip: If this is a default template it is still available for other Portal Users to use through the Customer Portal.
   
   
   
   
2. Make sure you click when you are done updating the available templates for the selected Portal User.

Edit template permissions

Edit template permissions for the steps and fields for all Portal Users in the selected template.

💡 Tip: When you edit template permissions in a Portal user’s profile this updates those permissions for all Portal Users who have access to that template. You will see these permissions reflected in the default permissions for templates on the main Portal Settings page.

1. Click next to the template that you want to change the permissions for. This opens the pop-up page where you can update the permissions as needed.
   
   
   
   
2. Make sure you click when you are done updating the template permissions for the for the selected Portal User.

Portal Users and Customers - what’s the difference?

Portal users

Portal Users have permission to access job information in your vWork account through a Customer Portal. Their Portal User profile sets what they can and can’t do for a Customer through the Customer Portal. Portal User Permissions are defined by the Default Portal Settings and User Permissions and customized in the Portal Users tab.

Customers in vWork

Customers in vWork have a Customer record that is accessed through the Customers page in vWork. Customers have jobs created for them in vWork by a Dispatcher, a Worker with the ‘Create Job’ permission or a Portal User. Customers don’t have access to the Customer Portal.

Key differences

The key difference between Portal Users and Customers is that Customers have jobs in vWork that organization does for them and Portal Users don’t. Portal Users manage jobs for Customers linked to them through the Customer Portal, performing limited functions of a dispatcher as set by their Portal User permissions.

When does a Portal User automatically create a new Customer in vWork?

When a new Portal User is created, vWork assumes they want to create and view jobs for themselves as Customers in vWork. The default is that their Portal User profile is used to create a Customer record in vWork when they create their first job through the Customer Portal.

🔔 Note: vWork also has an option that creates a Customer record the moment a Portal User signs up to use the Customer Portal. This is found in the Default User Permissions in the Portal Settings and is labeled Create new users as customers. When this option is enabled a Customer record is created in vWork when a new Portal User:

• signs up through the publicly enabled Customer Portal on the ‘Sign up Here’ page, or
• is manually added as a Portal User and finalizes their Portal User profile after clicking the activation link in their activation email.

When a Customer Record is automatically created from a Portal User it looks like this in the Portal Users settings.

• There is no 'Customer' in the ‘Customer Access’ field. The Portal User has user permissions that enable them to apply the default Customer Portal User Permissions to their own, automatically created, Customer record.
  
  🔔 Note: If the Portal User had customized user permissions for their own Customer record, their Customer name would show in the 'Customer Access' field. We explain more about this later in the  topic Customize Portal User permissions used to manage a customer’s jobs.
  
  
• To confirm a Portal User is linked to their own automatically created Customer  record, look at the 'Actions' field for the Portal User. When the Portal User is linked, you are able to click the link to ‘View the Customer’ record - even though there is no customer specified in the ‘Customer Access’ field.
  
  
• You can also see if the Portal User has activated their Portal User profile in the ‘Activated? ‘ field.

💡 Tips: 

• Portal Users won’t have a Customer record automatically created for them when they are linked to an existing Customer in vWork before a new Customer is created from their Portal User profile. The automatic creation of a Customer occurs only when no existing Customer is linked.
  
  
• To stop their Portal User profile creating a new Customer in vWork, the Portal User must be linked to an existing Customer either at:
  • the time the Portal User is manually added to the Customer Portal by a vWork admin, or 
  • any time before the Portal User creates their first job through the Customer Portal (provided the ‘Create new users as customers’ default user permission isn’t enabled).

We explain how to link a Portal User to a Customer in the topic below, Manually link a Customer to a Portal User.

Link a Portal User to an existing Customer in vWork

Who can Portal Users manage jobs for in the Customer Portal?

Portal Users can manage jobs in the Customer Portal for any Customer in vWork that is linked to their Portal User profile. Customers may be manually linked by a vWork Admin or be automatically linked from the Portal User profile at the time it is created. 

Once linked you can also customize the Portal User permissions to determine what the Portal User can do for that customer.

Why link to a Customer who doesn’t have the same information as a Portal User?

You may want to link a Portal User to an existing Customer when the Portal User is associated with the Customer but doesn’t have the same contact information or name. The Portal User could be from a parent or other related company, or have some other association that makes it useful for them to create and view jobs for a Customer in vWork.

A vWork Admin must manually link Portal Users to Customers when the Customer record isn’t automatically created from a Portal User profile.

When a Portal User is manually linked to a Customer it looks like this in the Portal User list. The Customer they are linked to shows in the 'Customer Access' field. 

Manually link a Customer to a Portal User

Portal Users are manually linked in the 'Customer Data Access' section of a Portal User’s profile.

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users and either:
   • Click to open an existing Portal User’s profile, or
   • Click to add a new Portal User.
     
     
2. Scroll to the 'Customer Data Access' section and click . This adds a line where you can now add the Customer to the Portal User.
   
   
3. Click in the Search for Customers field and start typing the name of the Customer.
   💡Tip: You must type at least the first two characters to display a drop-down list of customers that match your search criteria.
   
   
   
   
4. From the list of customers, click to select the customer you want to link to the Portal User.
   
   
   
   
5. You can now customize the user permissions to specify the access the Portal User has to perform tasks for this Customer in the Customer Portal. You only need to change these if you want the Portal User to have user permissions that are different from the defaults set in the Portal Settings. We explain how to do this in the next topic.
   
   
6. When you are done click to link the Customer to the Portal User.

Customize Portal User permissions used to manage a customer’s jobs

Customized User Permissions can be used to enable Portal Users to ‘Create’, ‘View’ and ‘Edit’ jobs in the Customer Portal for a selected customer. They override the Default User Permissions set in the Portal Settings for the selected Customer. 

Portal User permissions are customized in the ‘Customer Data Access’ section of a Portal User’s profile. They are divided into two types:

• Permissions for jobs created by the Portal User,
• Permissions for jobs created by a vWork dispatcher.

Customize Portal User Permissions

To customize Portal User permissions for a customer linked to a Portal User's profile:

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users and either:
   • Click to open an existing Portal User’s profile, or
   • Click to add a new Portal User.
     
     
2. Scroll to the 'Customer Data Access' section and if no customer is linked, link them to the Portal User. Instructions for how to link a customer are given in the topic Manually link a customer to a Portal User above.
   
   
3. Click to view the Portal User permissions set for the Customer.
   💡 Tip: The first time you view these permissions no options are enabled and the Default User Permissions in the Portal Settings are enabled.
   
   
   
   
4. Click to add a checkmark and enable the permissions you want to apply when the Portal User is managing jobs for the selected customer. You can enable Portal User permissions for jobs the Portal User creates for the Customer and also for jobs created by the Dispatcher through the vWork web app.
   
   In this example, we have enabled most of the Portal User permissions for all jobs created by the Portal User for this customer. The Portal User will be able to create jobs for this customer, view those jobs and also delete them, but they won’t be able to edit any job details themselves. They won’t be able to view, edit or delete jobs for this customer that are created by the dispatcher.
   
   
   
   
5. Click to confirm the changes you have made to the Portal User permissions.

Restore default Portal user permissions

If needed, it is simple to revert the Portal User permissions back to the Default User Permissions.

To revert customized Portal User permissions back to the default:

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users and click to open an existing Portal User’s profile.
   
   
2. Scroll to the ‘Customer Data Access’ section and click  to view the Portal User permissions set for the selected customer. 
   
   
3. Click .
   
   
   
   
4. Click to confirm the changes you have made to the Portal User permissions.

Identify when a Portal User has customized User Permissions at a glance

You can quickly identify which Portal User’s have customized user permissions by looking at the list of Portal Users in the Portal Users settings.

• When the Portal User Permissions are customized the ‘Permissions’ field displays ‘Custom’. 
• When the Portal User has the Default User Permissions the ‘Permissions’ field displays ‘Default’.

Unlink a Customer from a Portal User

You can unlink a Customer so that a Portal User can no longer manage jobs for them through the Customer Portal in the ‘Customer Access’ section of a Portal User’s profile.

To unlink a customer:

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users and click to open an existing Portal User’s profile.
   
   
2. Scroll to the ‘Customer Data Access’ section and find the Customer in the list of customers for this Portal User.
   
   
3. Click next to the selected customer to unlink them from the Portal User.
   
   
   
   
4. Click .

Related articles

To learn more about setting up your customer portal, please take a look at these articles:

• What is the Customer Portal? provides an overview of what the Customer Portal is and how it can be used.
  
  
• Plan your Customer Portal: this article helps you plan how you want your Customer Portal to work, what jobs you want customers to access, how you want to give customers access, and how you want Portal Users to manage jobs through it.
  
  
• Set up the Customer Portal: this explains how to set the defaults and user user permissions, enable public or private access and add job templates.
  
  
• Sign up and activate a Portal User, guides you through creating and activating Portal Users so they can use your Customer Portal. You are shown both the Portal User and the vWork Admin views of this process.

To learn more about how to use the Customer Portal as a Portal User, please take a look at these articles:

• Using the Customer Portal: provides an overview of the main activities a Portal User can do through the Customer Portal. This links to other articles that provide more detailed instructions for each of these activities.
  
  
• Create and view a Job in the Customer Portal: describes what a Portal User can see and do in the in Customer Portal ‘Jobs' tab.
  
  
• Using the Map in the Customer Portal: explains how a Portal User can use the Map tab to view their jobs.
  
  
• Set up a Job Alert in the Customer Portal: explains how a Portal User can set up a Job Alert to be notified of progress on their job by email or sms.