13. Your Company: Company Owner and Employees

GSMaRT Construction System can keep the books of several companies on one server. This chapter is for the people who run one of those companies: the Company Owner, the company's administrators, and the new employees who join with the Company Code. It explains how the companies are kept apart, the owner's first log-in, the three pages of the Company menu (Company Profile & Code, Employees & Users and Join Requests), and the join page a new employee uses to make an account. The Super Admin, who creates the companies and looks after the platform, has a chapter of their own: Super Admin: Managing Several Companies.

How several companies work

A few facts explain almost everything on the Company pages:

• Each company has its own database. A database is the store where the program keeps its records. Every company on the platform has a separate one: its customers, suppliers, items, transactions, reports, users, audit trail, logo, uploaded receipts and backups are in it and nowhere else. When you log in, the program opens your company's database and no other.
• Nobody can see another company's records. There is no report, link, setting or search that reaches into another company. A Company Owner cannot even see another company's user list. Your company is decided on the server when you log in, from your username; nothing typed in the address bar, a form or a cookie can change it.
• Everybody logs in on the same page. There is no company to choose. You type your own username and password; the log-in page looks the username up, finds the company it belongs to, and checks the password, the lock-out and the approval in that company.
• Usernames are unique across all companies. Because the log-in page finds your company by your username, no two people on the platform can have the same one, whatever company they are in, and no company user can have a Super Admin's username. A username can therefore be refused as "already taken" even though nobody in your own company uses it: choose another.
• The Company Code is only for joining. Each company has a code, for example STC-B8TJC. A new employee types it once, on the join page, to say which company they belong to. It is not a password: it logs nobody in and opens nothing. After joining, the employee always logs in with their own username and password.
• A company can be switched off. The Super Admin can make a company inactive. Its users are logged out at their next click with the message "Your company's access is currently suspended. Please contact your Company Owner.", nobody can log in or join, and everything in the company (database, users, records) is kept until it is switched on again.
• The checks are repeated on every click. Each time you open a page, the program checks again that your company is still active and that your account still belongs to it.

Who is who

What makes the Company Owner different

• Full authority. The owner can always open every page of the company and do everything on it, whatever the roles, Page Access Configuration and user overrides say. Nothing can lock the owner out of their own company. Effective Access (View as User) gives Company Owner as the reason.
• A protected account. Only the owner (or the Super Admin) can change the owner's account. On Employees & Users the owner's row shows Company Owner instead of a Manage button to everybody else, and on User Accounts an administrator who tries gets "Only the Company Owner can change the Company Owner's account."
• Cannot be deactivated. "The Company Owner cannot be deactivated. The Super Admin can make someone else the owner first."
• Chosen by the Super Admin. The owner of a new company is set when the Super Admin creates it (or later on the company's page); the owner of Company 1 is chosen on Multi-Company Setup. To hand the company over to someone else, ask the Super Admin.
• Shown in the user menu. Click your name at the top right: the first line reads Company Owner followed by your roles, for example Company Owner, Administrator.

The Company Owner's first log-in

When the Super Admin creates a new company with its owner's account, they give the owner a username and a temporary password, a password that must be replaced at the first log-in. In the examples of this chapter the company is ABC Distribution Corp. and its owner is John Doe, username johndoe.

Step by step

1. Open the log-in page of the program.
2. Type your username (for example johndoe) in Username and the temporary password in Password.
3. Click Log in. The Change password page opens with the message "Please replace your temporary password before continuing." You cannot open any other page until the password is changed.
4. In Current password, type the temporary password.
5. In New password, type the password you will use from now on. The line under the boxes gives your company's password rules.
6. Type the new password again in Confirm new password.
7. Click Change password. The message "Your password has been changed." appears and the Home page opens.

The password rules come from the company's settings (System Administration > Company, Security & Closing Date). A new company starts with the rules of the company its set-up was copied from, for example "at least 8 characters, upper- and lower-case letters, a number, a symbol. Passwords expire every 90 days." The new password must also not contain your username and must differ from the temporary one. If something is wrong you see one of these messages: "Your current password is incorrect.", "The new passwords do not match.", "Choose a password different from your current one." or "The new password must have ..." followed by what is missing.

After the change, the Home page of your company opens. The company name appears in the top bar beside the program name, and the sidebar has every module, including Company at the bottom.

What a new company already has

A company created by the Super Admin is not a blank database. It receives a copy of the set-up lists of another company (usually Company 1), so it can start work quickly:

• the company settings, with your company's own name, address, phone, e-mail and TIN (no logo and no closing date);
• the modules and pages of the menu, the user roles with their page access and special permissions;
• the document numbering, with every counter starting again from 1;
• the chart of accounts (with the bank account numbers left blank) and the module default accounts;
• the terms, tax codes, payment methods, price level names, customer types, billing groups, item categories, units of measure, and fixed asset categories with their accounts;
• one inventory site, Main.

Nothing else is copied: no customers, suppliers, items, employees or other names, no users (you are the only user), no transactions, balances, budgets, fixed assets, POS records or audit trail. That is why every figure on the Home page is zero.

Getting the new company ready

A good order for the first day:

1. Check the company details, the logo, the password rules and the closing date in System Administration > Company, Security & Closing Date.
2. Enter the bank account numbers in the Chart of Accounts, and add or remove accounts to suit the company.
3. Add the other inventory sites you use (Inventory > Inventory Site List) and the POS terminals (Point of Sale > POS Terminals) if you sell over the counter.
4. Enter or import your customers, suppliers and items (see System Administration for Import from CSV), then your opening balances.
5. Bring in your people: hand out the Company Code (see Company Profile & Code) or create their accounts with New user.

Company Profile & Code

This page shows your company as the platform knows it, its Company Code, and the rules for employees who join with the code. Everybody who can open the page sees the code, so it can be handed out; only the Company Owner can change it.

Where to find it: Company > Company Profile & Code. The Company Code button on Employees & Users opens it too.

In the first picture the page belongs to Company 1, Sample Trading Company, whose owner is the System Administrator (admin). In the second it is seen by John Doe, owner of the new company ABC Distribution Corp.; two employees are waiting for his approval.

What the page shows

The line under the code:

Fields

These fields are shown to the Company Owner (and to the Super Admin working inside the company). Other users see the code, the copy buttons, and one sentence under New employees saying whether employees who join wait for approval.

Step by step

To hand out the code:

1. Open Company > Company Profile & Code.
2. Click Copy code and paste the code into a message to the new employee, or click Copy join link and send the link instead.
3. Tell the employee to open the log-in page, click Join your company with its Company Code, and fill in the form (see "Joining your company with the Company Code" later in this chapter).

To make a new code (for example when the code was shared with the wrong people):

1. Click Regenerate code.
2. Confirm the question "Make a new Company Code? The current code stops working immediately."
3. The message "The new Company Code is ... The old one stopped working just now." shows the new code. Hand it out to the employees who still have to join.

Employees who already joined keep their accounts and keep logging in as before: they never use the code again.

To stop joining for a while, or to set an expiry date:

1. Under Joining, turn Employees can join with the code off, or leave it on and pick a date in Valid until (optional).
2. Click Save. The message reads "Joining with the Company Code is switched off." or "Employees can join with the Company Code."
3. To allow joining again, turn the switch back on (and clear or change the date), then click Save.

To change whether new employees need approval, and the role they start with:

1. Under New employees, tick or clear Every employee who joins waits for approval (recommended).
2. Choose a Role to start with, or leave Chosen when approving.
3. Click Save. The message is "Joining rules saved."

To change the company's name, address, phone, e-mail or TIN, click Edit company details at the top of the page. It opens System Administration > Company, Security & Closing Date, and the platform's record of your company follows what you save there. The Contact person is kept by the Super Admin on the platform.

Buttons

• Employees & Users: opens the list of the company's users.
• Edit company details: opens System Administration > Company, Security & Closing Date. It appears only for users who can open that page.

Good to know

• Only the Company Owner, and the Super Admin working inside the company, can regenerate the code, switch joining on or off, set the expiry date and change the approval rule. Administrators see the line "Only the Company Owner can make a new code or switch joining off." If someone else tries anyway, the answer is "Only the Company Owner can change the Company Code and the joining rules."
• The code's format. The code is made of the initials of the company name (up to three letters; words such as The, And, Of, Inc, Corp, Co, Ltd and LLC are skipped), a dash, and five random characters. The random part never uses characters that are easy to confuse (0 and O, 1, I and L). "Sample Trading Company" gives codes like STC-B8TJC; "ABC Distribution Corp." gives codes like AD-UW92E. Every code is unique on the platform, and a code that was replaced is never given out again.
• Typing the code. It can be typed with or without the dash, with spaces, in capitals or in small letters: AD-UW92E, aduw92e and AD UW92E are the same code.
• One message for every unusable code. A mistyped code, an old code, a code whose joining is switched off, an expired code and the code of an inactive company all get the same answer on the join page: "Invalid or inactive Company Code. Please verify the code with your Company Owner." This is on purpose: nobody can learn which companies exist by trying codes.
• Too many wrong codes. After 10 wrong codes from the same computer (the Super Admin can change the number) within 15 minutes, the join page refuses that computer for 15 minutes with "Too many attempts from this computer. Please wait 15 minutes and try again."
• A full-access role is never given without approval. If you clear the approval box, the starting role must be an ordinary role. The messages are "Without approval, new employees need a role to start with: choose one." and "A full-access role cannot be given to employees who join without approval."
• Every change on this page is written to your company's audit trail (actions Company Code Changed and Company Join Rules) and to the Super Admin's platform audit log.

Employees & Users

This is the Company Owner's list of everybody who has an account in the company, with what each person can do and how the account was made. From here you approve or reject the employees who joined, change roles, reset passwords, unlock, deactivate and activate accounts.

Where to find it: Company > Employees & Users. The Employees & Users button on Company Profile & Code, and the numbers under Users there, open it too.

The first picture shows the nine users of Sample Trading Company. The second shows ABC Distribution Corp. seen by its owner: John Doe himself and two employees, Maria Reyes (mreyes) and Paolo Cruz (pcruz), who joined with the Company Code and are waiting for approval.

When employees are waiting and you are not on the Join requests tab, a blue notice at the top says, for example, "2 employees are waiting for approval." with a Review the join requests link.

The tabs and filters

Waiting employees are always listed first; the others follow in order of name.

The columns

The Account made column reads:

• Created by an administrator: made on User Accounts (this includes every user who was there before the company joined the platform);
• Joined with the Company Code: the employee made the account on the join page;
• Created with the company: the owner's account, made by the Super Admin together with the company;
• Created by the Super Admin: an account the Super Admin made later, for example a new owner.

The Manage menu

Click Manage on a user's row to see what you can do with the account:

• Change roles: tick the roles the person should have.
• Reset password: give the person a temporary password.
• Unlock: shown only for a locked account.
• Activate: shown only for an inactive account.
• Deactivate: shown for active and locked accounts, except your own and the Company Owner's.
• All details, sites and POS terminals: opens the person's page on User Accounts, for the e-mail, employee number, sites, POS terminals and every other detail. It appears only if you may edit on User Accounts.

For a user of another company working here ("User of ..." under Account made), Reset password is not offered (their password is kept at their own company), and Deactivate and Activate read Remove access to this company and Give access back. Add user from another company at the top gives such access; see A user who works in two companies. A user of this company who also works elsewhere shows "Also works in" and the other company under their name.

Step by step

To change someone's roles:

1. Click Manage on the person's row, then Change roles.
2. In the Roles of ... window, tick the roles to give and clear the ones to take away. Full-access roles are marked (full access).
3. Click Save roles. The message lists the roles now held, for example "Roles of Ben Garcia saved: A/R Clerk."

To reset a password (for someone who forgot theirs):

1. Click Manage, then Reset password.
2. Type a Temporary password that follows the company's password rules.
3. Click Set temporary password. The message reads "Temporary password set. ... must change it at the next log-in."
4. Give the temporary password to the person. At their next log-in they must replace it on the Change password page. A locked account is unlocked by the reset.

To unlock an account:

1. Open the Locked tab (or find the person on All users).
2. Click Manage, then Unlock. The message reads "... was unlocked." The person can log in again with their own password.

To deactivate an account (for someone who has left):

1. Click Manage, then Deactivate.
2. Type a Reason (kept in the audit trail) if you wish.
3. Click Deactivate. The message reads "... was deactivated and can no longer log in. Their name stays on everything they entered." If the person is working at that moment, they are sent to the log-in page at their next click.

To activate an account again:

1. Open the Inactive tab.
2. Click Manage, then Activate. The message reads "... was activated and can log in again."

To add a user yourself, without the Company Code:

1. Click New user. The new-user form of User Accounts opens.
2. Fill it in as described there. The username must be free on the whole platform.

Approving and rejecting employees who joined with the code is described under Join Requests.

Buttons

• New user: opens the new-user form on User Accounts. It appears only if you may create on that page.
• Roles: opens User Role Configuration, where the roles and what they may do are set.
• Company Code: opens Company Profile & Code.

Good to know

• Users are never deleted, so their names stay on every record and audit entry they made. Deactivate a person who has left instead.
• The owner's row can only be changed by the owner (and the Super Admin). Other users see Company Owner in its Actions column instead of Manage. The owner's own Manage menu has no Deactivate.
• The Super Admin's account is never listed. When the Super Admin works inside your company, they use an account of their own that nobody can log into; it does not appear here or on User Accounts, but everything it does is in your audit trail.
• Permissions. Opening the page, like every page, is controlled by Page Access Configuration; on a new installation it follows the access of User Accounts. Change roles, Reset password, Unlock, Activate and Deactivate need the edit permission on the page; Approve and Reject need the approve permission. The Company Owner and full-access roles have both.
• Messages you may see: "Keep at least one role." (a user must keep a role), "You cannot remove the Administrator role from your own account." (an administrator other than the owner), "You cannot deactivate your own account.", "The Company Owner cannot be deactivated. The Super Admin can make someone else the owner first.", "Approve the registration first." (activating or unlocking an account that was never approved), "That user cannot be changed here." (the owner's account, for anyone but the owner).
• Temporary passwords must follow the company's password rules and may not contain the username; otherwise the message says what is missing, for example "The temporary password must have at least 8 characters, a symbol."
• Every change is written to the company's audit trail with the old and new values (roles, status, approval) and the reason when one was typed.

Joining your company with the Company Code

New employees can make their own account instead of waiting for an administrator to create one. All they need is the Company Code from their Company Owner. This section is written for the employee.

Where to find it: on the log-in page, under the Log in button: New employee? Join your company with its Company Code. A join link sent by the owner opens the same page with the code already filled in.

Fields

Step by step

1. Open the log-in page and click Join your company with its Company Code.
2. Fill in Full name, E-mail and, if you have one, Employee no.
3. Choose a Username, and type your Password twice.
4. Type the Company Code.
5. Click Create my account.

The page then confirms which company the account was made in, for example "Your account for ABC Distribution Corp. was created". If your company wants to approve new employees, it adds "Your Company Owner has to approve it before you can log in. Once it is approved, log in with the username mreyes and the password you chose." If it does not, it says you can log in now. Click Go to log in to return to the log-in page.

While you wait for approval

If you try to log in before the owner has approved your account, and your password is right, the log-in page answers "Your registration is waiting for approval by your Company Owner. You can log in once it is approved." Wait until the owner tells you the account is approved, then log in with your username and the password you chose. You are not asked to change the password: it is already your own.

If the owner rejected the registration, the answer is "Your registration was not approved. Please contact your Company Owner." With a wrong password you only see "Invalid username or password.", so nobody else can find out whether an account is waiting.

Messages on the join page

Join Requests

Join Requests lists the employees who made an account with the Company Code and wait for the Company Owner's approval. Approving lets the person log in with the role you choose; rejecting keeps them out, with a reason.

Where to find it: Company > Join Requests. When employees are waiting, the menu shows how many, for example Join Requests (2). The Join requests tab of Employees & Users, and the Review the join requests link in its blue notice, show the same list.

The page has the same tabs, filters, columns and buttons as Employees & Users; it simply opens on the Join requests tab. Clicking another tab takes you to Employees & Users. The employees who wait are also listed at the top of All users, above everybody else:

Before approving, check that you know the person: the full name, username, e-mail address and employee number in the row are what they typed on the join page.

Step by step

To approve an employee:

1. Click Approve on the employee's row.
2. In the Approve ... window, tick the role or roles the person should have. If the company has a Role to start with, it is already ticked. Full-access roles are marked (full access); give them only to people who should see and change everything.
3. Click Approve. The message reads, for example, "Maria Reyes is approved and can log in now."
4. Tell the employee they can log in. If they must work only at certain sites or POS terminals, set these afterwards with Manage > All details, sites and POS terminals (see User Accounts).

To reject a registration:

1. Click Reject on the employee's row.
2. Type the reason in Reason (kept in the audit trail). A reason is required.
3. Click Reject. The message reads "The registration of ... was rejected. They cannot log in." The person moves to the Rejected tab, with the reason under the status.

To approve a registration that was rejected earlier:

1. Open the Rejected tab of Employees & Users.
2. Click Approve on the row and continue as above. (A rejected registration cannot be rejected a second time.)

What it records

• Approving sets the account to Active, gives it the roles you ticked, and records you as the approver (shown as Approved by in the Status column). The audit trail gets a User Approved entry with the roles given.
• Rejecting sets the account to Rejected and inactive, keeps the reason, and records who rejected it (shown as By). The audit trail gets a User Rejected entry with the reason.
• The employee's own joining is in the audit trail too, as User Registered under the employee's username.
• Each of these is also written to the Super Admin's platform audit log.

Good to know

• A role is required. Approving without a role gives "Give ... at least one role before approving."
• Approve and Reject need the approve permission on the page. The Company Owner and full-access roles have it. Users without it see the list but no buttons.
• Approval can be switched off on Company Profile & Code. Employees who join then become active at once with the starting role, and this list stays empty.
• Nothing is deleted. A rejected registration stays on the Rejected tab; the username stays taken.
• The Super Admin sees the number of employees waiting in each company, but the approval belongs to the company.

Logging in when there are several companies

Everybody, owners and employees alike, logs in on the same page with their own username and password; the page subtitle reads Log in to your company. Besides the usual messages about wrong passwords and locked accounts (see Getting Started), you may meet these:

Working in two companies

A user who was given access to another company (see A user who works in two companies) logs in at their own company as always. The company name at the top of the screen then becomes a switch.

1. Click the company name at the top (on a phone, the building button beside the program name).
2. The list Your companies shows your own company ("Your own company") and each company that gave you access ("Access given to you"). The one open now is ticked.
3. Click the company to work in. Its Home page opens with "You are now working in ...". No password is asked.

While you work in the other company, a blue strip under the top bar says so: "You are working in ABC Distribution Corp. with access given to you. Your own company is Sample Trading Company." Click Back to Sample Trading Company on the strip, or use the switch again, to go back.

• In the other company you see its menus, records and reports, and you can do only what its roles for you allow. You are not a Super Admin and have no rights over the platform or other companies.
• Your password belongs to your own company: Change password is offered there, not in the other company.
• Each switch is recorded in the audit trail of the company you open.
• When the other company removes your access, or your own account is deactivated, the switch disappears; if you were working in the other company you are taken back to your own.