Contacts are the individuals included in client communication. Adding contacts provides members of the client’s team with access to the Client Portal and enables streamlined questions and collaboration.
There are several ways contacts can be set up, depending on the client’s structure. A client may have:
A single contact
Multiple contacts
Merged contacts (with access to 2+ businesses in their client portal)
Contact permissions
Permissions are set per client contact. Set contact permissions under the client's Portal Settings > Contacts tab.
Preview each contact's portal with the preview option in their contact row.
There are 4 optional client portal permissions that can be enabled for contacts:
Client admin
Access to all questions, files, financials, and tax items.
Access to all portal questions, even if assignable questions are on and the questions are not assigned to them.
Reassign questions to other contacts and respond to all questions.
By default client admin contacts will be shown a filtered view of questions assigned to them, but they can toggle to "all" questions to see everything.
When assignable questions is enabled, this contact will not receive automated reminders unless they are also assigned to the question.
Tax
View and take action on tax returns (tax return status tracker, tax return tab, tax return files) and organizers (organizer action items from the dashboard, auto-organized organizer files).
Can only view or take action on e-signature requests when they are listed as a recipient
Financial
Access to all published management reports and interactive client financials
Files:
CAN view all files made visible in the client portal (see how to make files visible)
CANNOT view items in the auto-organized "Tax return" or "Organizer" file folders
Adding new contacts
Adding a contact does not automatically notify that person that they have been added in Double. Bookkeepers can choose when their contacts receive notifications and control the frequency of their outbound communication from within Double.
To add a client from the close page,
Navigate to the Portal Settings by clicking Portal at the top of the close
Select Add Contact
To add a contact under your Practice Settings,
Navigate to Practice Settings by clicking the gear icon at the top right of your page (admin access only)
Go to Client portal
Click on the All contacts tab
Choose to Add contact
Note: If you receive an error message when adding a new contact, check in your Practice Settings (admins only) > Client Portal > All Contacts tab to see if they're already an existing contact. Give them client access under the Client(s) column
Merging contacts
If your contact already exists in another file, you'll need to give that contact access to this file in your All Contacts settings.
Go to Practice Settings > Client Portal > All Contacts
Locate the contact
Click into the Client(s) cell and add all applicable clients
How contacts switch between businesses in the Client Portal
Clients with multiple businesses can easily switch between businesses in the portal via the drop down menu in the top right-hand corner of the portal. This drop down also shows them if they have other open questions in other businesses.
Emailing and texting contacts
Select "Message Client" at the top of the close page to manually email or text any client portal contacts.
More on messaging the client 👉 HERE!
Preview client portal experience
To view the portal from each contacts' perspective
Go to Portal Settings by clicking the Portal button at the top of the close
Selecting the Preview (👁️) icon
Note: Users cannot switch views for merged contacts while in preview mode.
More on the client's experience in the portal 👉 HERE!
Deleting contacts
To delete a contact,
Go to Portal settings
Select Actions (column in the contact's row)
Choose "Delete contact"
What to know about deleting a contact
Deleting a contact does not notify the client.
Deleting a contact will remove their access to the portal (and erase any existing passwords from the system).
When a contact is deleted, all previous responses to questions will remain in the portal and show they're from an "Unknown" contact.
Deleting a contact does not remove any questions they're assigned to in the portal.
Manually sending magic links & reset password emails
When in doubt, users can manually send fresh magic links as well as reset password links to their contacts under Portal Settings > Contacts > Actions.
What to know about sending links to contacts
Allow time for the link to be delivered to their inbox. This may take a few mins.
Magic links expire in 6 hours or after a single use.
Password reset links expire within 1 hour.
Each new magic link immediately invalidates all previous magic links.