5.3.5 Giving Access to the Portal
To give a property owner access to the Portal, the user’s details, including email address, must be entered through the Block Area: The Block -> Block Summary
There are 2 places where you can send an invite to the Portal:
- Block Area -> The Block -> Block Summary -> Unit Details
- Workbench -> Portal -> Email Invite
Individual Access to the Portal
The steps below describe how to add People Involved and grant them Web Access on an individual basis.
If the owner is not already listed in the ‘People Involved’ section then select [Add New Person].
This presents a pop up screen which enables the user to select the type of person that needs to be added, be it an Owner, Agent,Rentee (sometimes referred to as Tenants) or Other.
Rentee type people involved records will not be able to access the Portal and will also not be able to be part of the Management Team and therefore these 2 options are disabled when you add a Rentee. ]
Other type people involved records can access the Portal but do not have demands against them.
Among the details to be entered are whether this user will be part of the Management Team or if they require Web Access.
If the owner is listed in the ‘People Involved’ section, but ‘Web Access’ is ‘N’ then select [Edit] and tick the ‘Web Access’ option. This only enables you to allow Web Access to one user at a time.
If the owner is listed in the ‘People Involved’ section and the ‘Web Access’ option is ‘Y’ then select the [Send Login] option.
You are then presented with a pop up to preview the email:
Once you click Send Email, it will send an email to the person’s email account, giving them instructions on how to access the Portal.
You can edit the basic template as well as add multiple email templates for this type within the settings screen. More information on this article: 3.5.4 Organisation
There is a way to add 'People Involved' in bulk. This is found in the article: 3.1.3 Agent Management
Bulk Email Invite to access the Portal
In order to grant access to the Portal in bulk, use the 'Portal' menu which can be found in the Workbench called Portal -> Email Invite.
The user is presented with a 'Select Block' drop down which allows them to pick a block and that block's owners and agents will be displayed.
The example above shows Fred Jennings has not yet been granted Web Access hence the x against the Web Access option. The 'Enable Web Access' button will become active if anyone on the list requires Web Access. This is especially useful when you have a block with a lot of units and you don't want to go into every single unit to give 'Web Access'.
NOTE: If an owners belongs to multiple units but has the same email address, you still need to individually enable/disable web access within the block area when you want to.
You can bulk update this in this screen.
The second screenshot shows Fred has been granted Web Access hence the Tick against the 'Web Access' option.
In order to send a Bulk Email Invite, select the users and click on the 'Send Email' button. This brings up a Leaseholder Portal Access email with the username pre-populated for one user or the variable <%UsernName%> which will be replaced by the actual usernames and will be mailed to the various email addresses.
Don't forget that you can set templates for each block under Portal Settings: 5.2.1 Portal Setting - Workbench
When a user first logs on to the Portal they are required to accept the ‘Terms of Use’ and review their personal preference settings.
If you wish to disable an owner’s access to the system then this can be performed by setting the ‘Web Access’ option to ‘N’ for the chosen user.
In order to view the Email Invites that you have sent to various leaseholders, you can view the emails in Agent Management -> Distribution Manager, click on the 'History' tab and select the block. In order to view the actual email that was sent, click on the blue EMAIL under the PDF heading.
Bulk Letter Invite to access the portal
If Leaseholders do not already have an email address to which you can send an email invitation inviting them to use a portal, you can generate letters that can be used for 'Mail Merge'. You can then send these letters yourself to the Leaseholders. These letters contain a unique access code that will enable them to register on the Portal.
The Letter Invite menu can be found on the Workbench -> Portal -> Letter Invite.
Once a block is selected, the leaseholders who belong to that block are listed.
If the leaseholder already has an access code generated, it will display but if not select the leaseholders who need the access code and click on ‘Generate Access Code’.This button allows you to generate an access code as many times as you like. You can also just click on 'CSV Extract' and it will generate an access code while the extract is downloaded.
Once their access codes have been generated, click on ‘Download Template’ to obtain the Letter template that will go out to the leaseholders.
Then click 'CSV Extract' to obtain the extract for Mail Merging with the downloaded 'Letter Template' (see example at the bottom: Letter_Template) .
In order to incorporate the CSV into the template, click on Mailings -> Select Recipients -> Use an existing list
Initially the ‘Preview Results’ option is disabled but once the merge is done, the Preview Results (see example at the bottom: Letter_Template _Populated) is enabled and clickable thereby enabling you to skim through the letters that are ready to be printed and sent out. These letters will each contain a unique access code (same as the one on the screen that you generate) which the leaseholder can use to register on the leaseholder portal. If a leaseholder phones up because they may have lost the letter, then you can give them their code over the phone as well.
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