How your client gets their link
Two ways in: the private link you email them, or an account they create themselves. Both open the same page.
The moment you send an engagement, your client receives an email from you with a link to their own private page. That page is the portal: it lists what you need, and it is where they upload it.
Only your clients can get in
Nobody can create an account on your portal by themselves. There is no public sign-up. A client gets an account only from a link you send them, which means the people in your portal are exactly the people you put there.
The first time they follow one of your links they choose a password, and after that they sign in whenever they like. It takes them about twenty seconds and they only do it once.
The two ways a client gets access
Most of the time you do not have to think about this at all. Every email you send a client through Vylan carries a private link to their own page, and the first time they follow one it offers to set them up.
When you want to give someone access before you have sent them any work, open their client page and press Give portal access. Vylan emails them an invitation, and if you have no email address on file it hands you the link to send however you like.
You also get a portal link of your own from Settings, beside your logo and brand colour. Put it behind the Client Portal button on your website. It is the page where your clients sign in, so it is safe to publish: nobody can create an account from it.
Access is tied to the client record you invited, not to their email address. So a client whose email you have never recorded can still have a portal, and changing an email later does not quietly hand their documents to someone else.
What the page says when they arrive
The top of the page greets them by name and tells them who is asking:
- Hi Marie,
- Here's what Lavoie CPA needs from you.
- Your files are private and shared only with Lavoie CPA.
Underneath is the checklist you built, with a progress counter so they can see how far along they are.
If they lose the email
Clients lose emails. It is the most ordinary thing in the world. You can resend the link from the engagement, and Vylan's automatic reminders each contain the link again, so a client who ignored the first email gets another route back in without having to ask you.
Reminders go out by email on their own schedule until the documents are in. See how automatic reminders work.
Your branding, not ours
The portal carries your firm's name, your logo, and your brand colour, which you set once in your firm settings. The same accent colour is used in the emails your clients receive. To your client, this reads as your firm asking, because it is.