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

In this article we show you what a Portal User sees in the Customer Portal and what a vWork Admin sees in vWork when they are created as Portal Users and are activated to use the Customer Portal. This expands on the information in the article, How do customers get access to my Customer Portal?

💡 Tip: We have another article, Customize Portal User permissions and template access, that explains how to manage Portal User links to Customers in vWork and the templates a Portal User has access to in the Customer Portal. 

Topics in this article include:

• Overview of the process to set up a Portal User
• Set up a Portal User through a publicly enabled Customer Portal
• Manually add a Portal User to a privately enabled Customer Portal
• Remove a Portal User from the Customer Portal
• Related articles

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

Overview of the process to set up a Portal User

Portal Users can be added to your Customer Portal by one of two methods. They can:

• Click the signup link on the Customer Portal Login page.
  The signup link is only available through a publicly enabled Customer Portal. We explain the process of signing up a Portal User through the signup link in the topic, Set up a Portal user through a publicly enabled Customer Portal.
  
  
• Be manually added to the Customer Portal by a vWork Admin.
  Portal Users of a publicly enabled Customer Portal can be added this way, but this method is primarily used to sign up Portal Users to a privately enabled Customer Portal. We explain this process in the topic below, Manually add a Portal User. 

In both instances Portal Users have their Portal User profile created and then they activate it from an email automatically sent to them at the time their Portal User profile is created. 

Portal Users are required to enter their own contact details, create a password and activate their Portal User account to start using the Customer Portal.

Set up a Portal user through a publicly enabled Customer Portal

When a Customer Portal is publicly enabled a Portal User:

1. sets themselves up through the signup link on the Customer Portal login page. 
2. activates their Portal User profile (account) from an email.

The public Customer Portal signup link

To sign up and log in to your Customer Portal when it is publicly available your customer needs the Customer Portal website URL. It is customized to your organization and looks something like this:

yourportalname.vwork.io.

When a customer opens the public Customer Portal website it displays a signup link on the 'Login' tab.

1. The customer clicks the signup link. This opens the 'Signup Here' form where they enter their contact information. 
   
   
2. Once they have entered their information and created a password they click .
   
   
   
   
3. This opens the Customer Portal 'Login' tab and a message displays at the top of the screen instructing them to check their email for activation instructions.
   
   ❗ Important: The Portal User isn’t able to log in until they have completed the activation sent to them in the automatically generated email.
   
   

Activating a Portal User to use the public enabled Customer Portal

1. After a customer signs up to use the Customer Portal through the signup link, but before they activate their Customer Portal account, a vWork Admin will see them listed in the Portal Users settings without an activation status.
   
   
   
   💡 Tip: You can also resend the activation email to a Portal User from here.
   
   
2. To finalize their Portal User profile, so they are able to log in to the Customer Portal, the new Portal User must click the ‘activation link’ in the email sent to their email address. This activates their Portal User profile and logs them into the Customer Portal for the first time.
   
   Once activated a vWork Admin can see they have activated their account in the Portal User settings. They can now login and use the Customer Portal at any time.
   
   
   
   💡 Tip: The activation email changes the 'activation' link to a 'login link' after activation. By keeping this email Portal Users have a quick and easy method to open and log in to the Customer Portal.

Manually add a Portal User to a privately enabled Customer Portal

If your Customer Portal is enabled as ‘private’ there is no signup link option on the Customer Portal login page. Portal Users can only be manually added to your privately enabled Customer Portal by a vWork Admin through the Portal Users settings.

💡 Tip: Portal users can also be manually added to the Customer Portal when it is publicly enabled following this process.

When a Portal user is manually added the process is:

1. The Portal User is added to the Customer Portal using their email address.
2. The Portal User activates their Portal User Profile from an email and adds their contact information and password at the same time.

Manually add a Portal User

You only need an email address to manually add a Portal User. They enter all other contact details themselves as part of the activation process after they are added as a Portal User.

To manually add a Portal User:

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users
   
   
2. Click .
   
   
   
   
3. Enter the Portal User’s email address in the Email Address field, then click .
   
   
   
   
4. Before the Portal User clicks the activation link a vWork Admin can see their Portal User profile in the Portal Users settings. They show as not activated and without a name. The only information you have for them at this time is their email address. 
   
   
   
   
5. To finalize their Portal User profile, so they are able to log in to the Customer Portal, they click the activation link in the email. This logs them into the Customer Portal for the first time. Their Portal User profile becomes fully activated when they enter their contact details and a password and then click .
   
   
   
   
6. Once they have created their account they are automatically logged in to the Customer Portal and can start using it. They are now able to login and use the Customer Portal at any time.
   
   A vWork Admin can also see they have activated their account in the Portal User settings and their Portal User profile also shows their name.
   
   

💡 Tip: The activation email changes the 'activation' link to a 'login link' after activation. By keeping this email Portal Users have a quick and easy method to open and log in to the Customer Portal.

Remove a Portal User from the Customer Portal

You can remove a Portal User from the Customer Portal in the Portal Users settings 

When you remove a Portal User:

• they no longer have access to the Customer Portal and are unlinked from any Customer in vWork they have been able to manage jobs for through the Customer Portal
• Customers linked to their Portal User profile remain unchanged as Customers in vWork.
• Jobs created by the Portal User remain in the same state that they were at the the time the Portal User is removed from the Customer Portal.

To remove a Portal User from the Customer Portal:

1. Go to Settings > Portal> Portal Users.
   
   
2. Find the Portal User on the list of Portal Users.
   💡 Tip: You can quickly find the Portal User by typing their name in the Search Users field.
   
   
3. Click Remove in the ‘Actions’ field.
   
   
   
   
4. vWork displays a message asking you to confirm that you want to remove this Portal User. Click Okay to confirm that you do.
   
   
5. A banner displays at the top of the Portal Users page confirming the Portal User is removed.
   
   

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.
  
  
• Customize Portal User permissions and template access, explains how to manage Portal User links to Customers in vWork and the templates a Portal User has access to in the Customer Portal.

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.