Clients and client portals
Client records, the no-login client portal, what clients can do there, and how to switch a portal off, give it an expiry date or replace its link.
3 min readUpdated Oct 17, 2026Applies to YourDesk 1.0.0
On this page
Clients
Clients lists every relationship on the desk. A client record holds the studio or company name, a key contact, email, city, website and industry. Each client page brings together:
- the portal and its link,
- the client-update conversation,
- the details above,
- the client's projects and invoices,
- the history of everything that has happened with them, and
- the files they sent through the portal.
Clients are also created for you when you create a project or turn a proposal into a project for a company that is not on the desk yet.
Important
Proposals, invoices and client updates are matched to a client by its company name, not by a fixed link. If you rename a client, older proposals and invoices that still carry the old name stop appearing on its page and portal. Keep names consistent, or edit the older records to match.
The client's email matters: it is where reminders, follow-ups and letters go when you have a mailbox connected. Reminders and follow-ups go out by themselves only if the studio owner has turned on Email clients automatically. See Automatic reminders.
The client portal
Every client gets one portal link, /p/<token>, created with the client. The client opens it in any browser, with no account and no password.
What the client sees and can do
| Section | What it shows | What the client can do |
|---|---|---|
| Projects | Each project's phase, progress and status | Read |
| Invoices | Number, amount, status and due date | Open each invoice's own link |
| Proposals | Title, amount, status, who signed | Open a proposal and accept or decline it |
| Updates | The client updates you have posted to them | Read |
| Messages | A conversation with the studio | Write back |
| Requests | Things you asked them for ("Logo files, a yes on copy") | Answer |
| Deliverables | Work you put up for review | Approve or ask for changes with a comment |
| Files | Files either side attached | Upload a file of up to about 900 KB |
| Ask for access | "A colleague needs in?" | Send a colleague's name and email to the studio |
Messages the client writes are labelled with the client's name on the server, so a visitor cannot post as the studio.
What you see on the studio side
Client portals lists every portal and links to each client's page, where the portal controls live. There you can copy or preview the link, post messages, ask for something, put up a deliverable, attach a file for them, and see the files they sent. The portal shows how many times it has been opened and when the client was last seen.
Note
Nothing notifies you when a client writes, uploads, answers or approves. Check the client's page yourself. Approving a colleague's access request only records your decision; the colleague still needs the same portal link, which you send them.
Switching a portal off, expiring and replacing the link
| Control | Effect |
|---|---|
| Turn off / Turn on | Off closes the portal: the page says it is closed, and every action behind it (messages, uploads, answers, approvals, access requests) is refused. |
| Expires | Pick a date and Save expiry. The portal closes once that date begins (midnight UTC). Clear the date to keep it open. |
| Reset link | Issues a new token and copies the new link. The old portal link stops working at once. |
These controls apply to the portal page only. Each proposal (/d/…) and invoice (/i/…) has its own link that keeps working regardless of the portal's state, and those links do not expire. Share them with that in mind.
A platform admin can also switch Portals off for the whole deployment under Ops → Product. Every portal link then shows as closed and refuses its actions, and Client portals leaves the sidebar, though you can still manage portals from each client's page. Proposal and invoice links are not affected.
Files
Files on the portal (and on tasks) are stored inside the database as encoded data, up to about 900 KB each. There is no external file storage in 1.0.0, so keep large deliverables on a file-sharing service and post the link in a message or deliverable note.