New user

Here's how to add a new user to your FreeAgent account.

Why would I need to add a new user?

You might want to do this for several reasons.

Only when someone is added as a user can you record payments made to that person, such as salaries or dividends, or keep track of any out-of-pocket expenses that person has paid for and needs to be reimbursed for.

And only when someone is added as a user can they have access to your account.

Can different users have different levels of access to my account?

Yes. So you might want to give your bookkeeper access to the whole of your FreeAgent account, but there may well be certain members of staff who'll never need to see the system at all, and you can set them up as a user but give them no access.

OK, please show me how to set up a new user.

Click the Settings option at the top of the screen, then click Users.

If you can't see this option, then you don't have access to this area and you'd need to ask your accountant, or whoever set you up to use FreeAgent, to extend your user permissions.

You'll see on the Users screen any users you have already set up. When you open your new FreeAgent account you automatically become a user.

Click the New User button here.

Enter the person's details, including their National Insurance number if you're going to pay them a salary, so that it prints on their payslips.

Choose what kind of a user this individual is.

Director or employee?

Setting them as a director means that FreeAgent will use the Director setting for National Insurance on the payroll. Choose Company Secretary or Employee if you want the software to use the Employee setting for this individual's National Insurance.

Accountant

You can make salary and dividend payments to, and record expenses for, any kind of user except an accountant. You'd need to set your accountant up as a user so that they can see your account, if they're not one of our FreeAgent Friendly accountant partners. FreeAgent Friendly partner accountants have automatic access to their clients' accounts so you wouldn't need to set them up here.

Mileage

If you're setting this user up part way through the tax year, and they've travelled some miles in their own car on business for your company, put in the number of miles they've travelled so far, here.  This is so that FreeAgent will change the mileage from 40p a mile to 25p a mile at the right time.

User password

Tick the box to send the user a customised e-mail to invite them to create a password when they first sign in.

Setting access levels

The further you slide this bar over to the right, the more access to the system the user has. For users who'll never need to use the system at all, drag the bar fully over to the left.

For users who need full access, including posting journals and editing more advanced settings such as VAT, drag the bar fully over to the right.

 

Once you've finished entering your user's information, click Create New User to save the information, or Cancel to close this screen without creating the new user.

Your user is now set up and you can start recording their salary, dividends and expenses through FreeAgent.