Customer contacts and the client portal

Add the people at a customer, choose what each one is sent, and give them access to the client portal.

For office staffLast reviewed 30 September 2026

On this pageBefore you start

A customer can have several people, and each one can be sent different things and given their own access to the client portal, rather than one shared login for the whole business.

Before you start

Only the owner, admins, dispatchers and office staff can manage a customer's contacts. Only the owner and admins can invite a contact to the client portal, generate a sign-up link, change what a login can see, or revoke access.

Add a contact

Open the customer and, under Contacts, select + Add contact.
Enter their Name, an optional Role (for example "Accounts" or "Site manager"), and either an Email or a Phone (at least one is required).
Select Add contact.

The Main contact is the one your customer's own Email field mirrors, so editing either one moves both. A main contact cannot be removed directly; select Make main on another contact first.

Choose what each contact receives

Every contact has four switches: Invoices, Quotes, Reports and Reminders. Turn on whichever this person should be emailed. A contact who has unsubscribed shows "This contact unsubscribed. Nothing is emailed to them."

Give portal access

On a contact's row:

Invite to portal sends an invite. If that email already has a working ONYX1 login elsewhere, this becomes Give portal access instead, so you can connect the existing login without a new invite.
Copy sign-up link gives you a link to send however you like once they are invited but have not set a password. It expires in 14 days; make a new one any time.
Email them a sign-up link appears when copying the link yourself would not be safe to hand over, for example an unconfirmed account at that address. ONYX1 emails it directly so only that person can complete it.
Revoke withdraws access at any time. After revoking, a contact without a password gets Restore access; a contact who already has a password gets Give portal access so you can restore access without another sign-up.

Once a contact has portal access, choose Change under "Can see" to set:

Whole account: every job for the customer, plus every invoice and quote you have sent them.
Selected jobs: only the jobs you tick, and their site reports and safety documents. No invoices or quotes at all, even for the jobs you tick.

This only controls what they can open by signing in; what gets emailed to them is still the four switches above.

Occasionally a login has no matching contact any more (the contact was removed, or its email changed). These appear under Portal logins with no contact. Active entries keep the Revoke and Can see scope controls; withdrawn entries remain visible as Access withdrawn, so nothing is left unmanageable.

What the customer sees

A customer signs in to a light page with your business's logo and name at the top. If they work with several businesses that use ONYX1, that name is also a switcher: it lists each one with what is waiting there, and the portal opens on the business that has something waiting, otherwise the one they used last.

The page shows four summary cards (To pay, Quotes to answer, Your jobs and Shared with you) and one list of everything shared with them: quotes, invoices, jobs, site reports, safety documents and photos. Chips above the list narrow it (Needs you, Jobs, Quotes, Invoices, Reports, Safety documents, Photos), and a search box finds a number or a job. Needs you holds a quote waiting for an answer and any overdue invoice. Selecting a row opens it beside the list, or full screen on a phone.

Whole-account access shows quotes and invoices as well as the jobs. Selected-job access shows only the chosen jobs and their site reports, safety documents and photos.

An invoice opened in the portal has a How to pay panel. ONYX1 does not take card payments: the panel shows the payment details you put in the invoice's Notes (such as your bank account), the invoice number to quote as the reference, and, for an invoice that came from Xero, that it can also be paid from the Xero invoice you emailed. If the invoice has no notes, it points the customer to the invoice PDF and the email. Put your bank account in the invoice Notes so it appears here.

A customer sees a job's photos only when you turn on Share photos with the customer for that job (see Work on a job). It is off by default, and only site photos are ever shared.

If something goes wrong

Give this contact an email address or a phone number. A contact needs at least one way to be reached.
This is the main contact. Make another contact the main one first. You cannot remove the main contact directly.
Add an email address to this contact first. A contact needs an email before you can invite them to the portal.
This email already has a portal account that has never been confirmed, so we can’t share your work with it yet. Send them a sign-up email: only someone who reads mail at that address can complete it, and then you can give them access. Use Email them a sign-up link instead of copying it yourself.