ClearBox FPA works with two kinds of organization: client workspaces, which hold the forecasts and reports, and accounting-firm workspaces, which are shells that firm staff use to reach their clients. This article covers how the two get linked, what a firm can see, and how billing ownership works.
These controls live under Organization Settings > Users (in a client workspace) or Clients and Users (in a firm workspace).
Link a firm to a client
A link is always started from the client side and accepted by the firm — there is no public directory of firms.
- A client owner or admin uses Invite Firm and enters the email of a firm owner or admin. This sends an invitation; the link exists only once the firm accepts it.
- The firm accepts from the emailed invitation, choosing which of its firm organizations to attach if it manages more than one.
A link is firm-wide: it lets the firm organization reach the client, but on its own it lets no individual firm staffer in. Access for specific people is granted separately, below.
Either side can end a link — a client uses Revoke on the firm, a firm uses Remove access on the client. Ending the link also clears every staff assignment tied to it.
Assign firm staff to a client
Once a firm is linked, a firm owner or firm admin grants individual staff access to a client under the client's Assignments, choosing Editor (can edit the model) or Viewer (read-only). A staffer can be assigned to a given client through only one firm at a time, and access takes effect only while both the firm link and the staff assignment are active.
Sponsored clients and billing ownership
Sponsorship decides who pays for and owns a client workspace. A firm has two ways to take it on:
- Create a sponsored client — a brand-new client workspace billed to the firm. The firm holds owner-level access, and the workspace is marked Firm Sponsored.
- Take over an existing client's billing — the client uses Transfer Billing to hand billing to the firm. The client's existing owners become admins, and if the workspace already has paid time, that term runs out before firm billing begins.
While a firm sponsors a client, the client has no direct owner of its own; the firm's owner or firm admin holds owner-level access. The sponsoring firm shows on the client's settings as a read-only Sponsoring Accounting Firm, kept separate from any Additional Accounting Firms that hold only a plain access link.
Transfer a client off the firm
Transfer Ownership (firm side) graduates a sponsored client into an independent workspace. The firm picks an existing client admin to become the new owner, and billing moves to the client immediately. This ends sponsor-controlled pricing for good — future client-owned renewals use standard pricing — and the firm stays attached afterward as an ordinary linked firm.
Closing a sponsored workspace is a different, destructive action: it cancels billing and deletes the client workspace entirely, and it is allowed only when no direct client users remain.
Who can do what
- Invite or revoke a firm link, and manage staff assignments: a client owner or admin (on the firm side, a firm owner or firm admin).
- Start or transfer sponsorship, and transfer ownership: owner-level access only — a plain admin cannot.
- Firm Admin is the firm-side admin role. Firm staff reaching a client act with the Editor or Viewer access they were assigned; their firm role does not carry into the client workspace.
For the roles that apply inside a single workspace, see Manage Team Access.