ক্লায়েন্ট এরিয়া

The client area is what your customers see: the public front pages, the sign-in, and the account where they pay invoices, manage services and domains, and open tickets. It is the face of your hosting business, so this chapter walks through it page by page. You may hand it to your customers as it is. For the admin side of each page see Clients, Invoices and payments and Support.

Two groups of pages

Under Setup > General Settings > Other you can switch five client area pages off: Announcements, Knowledgebase, Network Status, Contact Us and Downloads. A page that is off disappears from the menu. Domains (Enable Domains), Affiliates (Enable Affiliate System) and Add Funds (Enable Add Funds) have switches on their own tabs. See Settings.

Home

The Home page opens with a banner: How can we help you today? and a domain search box. Both texts and the search box are options of the client theme (see Themes). Under the banner are shortcut tiles (Store, Knowledgebase, Announcements, Network Status, Support Tickets, Client Area), the five most popular Knowledgebase articles and the three latest announcements. When a network issue is open, an orange line above the tiles names it and links to the Network Status page. A signed-in client also gets a Welcome back strip with four figures: services, domains, unpaid invoices and open tickets.

Register and sign in

Register asks for Personal Information and Billing Address, then Account Security: the password (the strength meter shows as you type), a security check, an optional newsletter box and, if you require it, the Terms of Service box. Which address fields are required is set under Setup > Order Form Settings (First Name and Last Name are always required). Your own custom client fields appear on the form too. When registration is closed (Allow Client Registration off under the Ordering tab) the page says so and points to Contact Us. If E-mail Verification is on, the new client gets a mail with a link and the dashboard shows a warning with Resend the verification e-mail until the address is confirmed.

Login takes the e-mail address and the password. If two-factor authentication is on, a second screen asks for the 6-digit code. Forgot password? asks for the e-mail address and always answers the same sentence, so nobody can find out which addresses exist. The mailed link works once and for one hour. A sub-account resets its own password the same way.

Dashboard

Client Area Home shows four tiles (Services, Domains, Unpaid Invoices with the amount due, Support Tickets), a red or orange banner with up to five unpaid invoices and a Pay now button, the active services with Manage, domains that expire within 60 days with Renew, and the latest tickets. The side column holds Your Info with an Update button, Account Credit when there is credit, the Affiliate Program box and the Downloads box. Order New Services at the top goes to the Store.

My Services

The list has status tabs (All, Active, Pending, Suspended, Terminated, Cancelled), a search by product or domain, and a Manage button per row. The product page has an Overview with the status, registration date, recurring amount, billing cycle, next due date, payment method, server, username and nameservers. An unpaid invoice for the service shows as a warning with Pay now. For a product with a module, the page adds a Login to Control Panel button and the usage bars (disk and bandwidth). Left menu items, each shown only when it applies:

• Change Password - sets the password of the account on the server (active services with a module).
• Upgrade/Downgrade - shows the products you allow, then the billing cycle and the prorated amount. If money is due, Continue to payment creates an invoice; otherwise Confirm the change applies it.
• Change Billing Cycle - when you allow it.
• Request Cancellation - a reason and the type End of Billing Period or Immediate. The request goes to your staff; nothing is cancelled by the client alone. See Orders.

The switches are on the Ordering tab of General Settings: Allow Cancellation Requests, Allow Upgrades / Downgrades and Allow Billing Cycle Changes.

My Domains

The list has the same tabs and search, plus the buttons Register a New Domain and Transfer in a Domain. A domain has these pages: Overview (dates, registration period, recurring amount, registrar lock, auto renew), Nameservers (at least two, up to five), Contact Information, Registrar Lock, Get EPP Code (shown and e-mailed), Addons (DNS Management, ID Protection, Email Forwarding), DNS Management (records) and Renew Domain. Add to invoice and pay makes a renewal invoice at once; the other choice puts the renewal in the cart. Auto Renew can be switched off, and the client then gets no automatic renewal invoice. What works depends on the registrar plugin; see Domains and Registrars.

Invoices and paying

My Invoices lists invoices with the tabs All, Unpaid, Paid, Cancelled, Refunded, Collections and Payment Pending. Unpaid ones have a blue Pay button, and overdue ones an Overdue badge. Buttons at the top: Add Funds (when on) and Mass Payment.

An invoice shows the company, Invoiced To and Pay To, the lines, Sub Total, Credit, tax, Total, the Balance and the related transactions. Download gives a PDF and Print a print view. Under an unpaid invoice the client picks a Payment Method and the gateway's own form appears, for example a card form or a redirect button. A client with credit sees Apply Credit with an amount box.

Every invoice e-mail carries a link of the form /pay/<code>. It shows the same invoice and payment form without signing in, so a customer can pay from a phone in two taps.

Mass Payment lists all unpaid invoices with ticks. Pay with credit settles them from the credit balance. Create one invoice makes a single invoice for all balances; when it is paid every invoice it stands for is marked paid.

Add Funds asks for an amount and a payment method; the minimum, the maximum per payment and the maximum balance are your settings on the Credit tab. It makes an invoice with one Add Funds line, and the amount lands in the credit balance when the invoice is paid. Credit then pays later invoices on its own.

Payment Methods lists saved cards (only with a gateway that can store them) with Make default and Delete.

Quotes

My Quotes lists quotes with the stage and Valid Until. A quote shows the items, the totals and your proposal text. A delivered quote has Accept Quote, which creates the invoice, and Decline Quote. An expired quote shows a warning to contact you.

Support Tickets

The list shows Open, Closed and All with a search and Open New Ticket. The form asks for the Department, Subject, a Related Service (the client's own services and domains), Priority (Low, Medium, High), the Message and Attachments (the allowed types and the size limit show under the box). A ticket page shows the conversation, a Staff badge on your replies, a reply form, Close Ticket, and, when the department asks for it, How did we do? with 1 to 5 stars after closing. Replying to a closed ticket opens it again.

A visitor who has no account can write on Contact Us: it opens a ticket in a department that does not need a login. A guest can follow, answer and close such a ticket at its private link (/ticket/<number>/<code>), and may rate it when the department asks for feedback. See Support.

Knowledgebase, Announcements, Status, Downloads

• Knowledgebase - categories, search, popular articles. An article shows related articles and Was this answer helpful?. A private article asks the visitor to sign in. /kb is a short address for it.
• Announcements - newest first, ten per page, with an RSS button.
• Network Status - Open Issues with type, priority, status and what is affected, or All systems are running normally, then issues Resolved in the last 30 days.
• Downloads - categories and files with size and download count. A file for clients only, or for owners of a certain product, asks for sign-in or is refused.

Affiliates

When the program is open, Activate creates the affiliate account and mails the link. The page then shows Your Referral Link with Copy, visitors, referrals, the balance, Commission Rules (percentage or fixed, signup bonus, holding days, minimum payout), Your Referrals and the payment history. Request Withdrawal is enabled when the balance reaches the minimum, and one request waits at a time. A visit through the link is remembered for 90 days.

Account Details, Contacts, Password, Security

• Account Details - contact details and custom fields, Preferences (language, default payment method, e-mail preferences by kind: General, Product, Domain, Invoice, Support, Affiliate), and the newsletter box.
• Contacts/Sub-Accounts - add people with their own address. Tick Activate Sub-Account to give one a password and permissions from this list: Modify Master Account Profile, View & Manage Contacts, View Products & Services, View & Modify Product Passwords, View Domains, Manage Domain Settings, View & Pay Invoices, View & Accept Quotes, View & Open Support Tickets, View & Manage Affiliate Account, View Emails, Place New Orders/Upgrades/Cancellations. A Billing Contact receives copies of invoice e-mails. A sub-account only sees the pages it may use.
• Change Password - needs the existing password; the new one must differ and meet the minimum length.
• Security Settings - Two-Factor Authentication with an authenticator app (scan the code or type the key, then enter a code; turning it off needs the password), Active Sessions with Sign out and Log out other sessions, Single Sign-On (allow an administrator or a connected service to sign the client in) and Recent Sign-In Activity. Two-factor and single sign-on belong to the account owner; a sub-account signs in with e-mail and password.
• Email History - every e-mail sent to the client with date, subject and status; opening one shows the message.

Related: The store and cart, Gateways.