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Customer Approvals: Troubleshooting & FAQs

This article contains frequently asked questions and quick troubleshooting steps to resolve common issues.

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Article 4.1: Customer Did Not Receive the One-Time Passcode

If your customer reports that they did not receive the one-time passcode (OTP) email after clicking the request button, check the following:

  1. Verify the email address on the customer record. Go to the customer record in EBIS and confirm the email address is correct.

  2. Check the email used during estimate generation. When you generated the estimate via Preview & Send, the email address can be overridden. Verify that the email used in the wizard matches the email your customer is checking.

  3. Have the customer check spam/junk folders. The OTP email comes from EBIS and may be filtered by some email providers.

  4. Have the customer try again. The OTP request button includes a cooldown timer (visible as a countdown on the button). After the timer resets, the customer can request a new code.

If the issue persists, verify that the customer's email provider is not blocking emails from your EBIS domain.

 

 

Article 4.2: Items Not Appearing in the Estimate

If items you expect to see in the customer estimate are missing, the most common cause is the item's portal status.

Check the item's Portal: Customer Status. Only items with a status of Internal: Ready to Send are included when you generate an estimate via Preview & Send. Go to Customer Approvals → Approval Items and verify the status of the items in question.

If items are still at Internal: New or Internal: Review, update them to Internal: Ready to Send and then go through the Preview & Send process again.

Also check: Make sure the items are assigned to the correct billing customer. The Preview & Send wizard generates the estimate for a specific customer, so items billed to a different customer will not be included.

 

 

Article 4.3: Photos Not Showing on the Customer Estimate

If photos attached to a work order item are not appearing on the customer-facing estimate, there are two things to check:

  1. Media visibility toggle. Go to the item in the work order, click the Media tab, and look at each photo. There is an eyeball icon on each image. If the icon shows the media as hidden (eyeball with a line through it), click it to make the photo visible on the estimate. The icon should show as a blue eyeball when visible.

  2. User profile permission. The user who is toggling photo visibility must have the Show/Hide Media on Portal Estimate permission enabled on their user profile. Without this permission, the eyeball toggle will not be available.

 

 

Article 4.4: User Cannot Send Estimates

If a user can see the Customer Approvals tab but the Preview & Send process is not available or not working, check their user profile permissions.

Required permission: The user's profile must have Allow Generation of Portal Estimate enabled. This permission is found at Config → User Profiles → [Profile] → Access Levels → Portal.

Without this permission, the user can view and edit items on the Customer Approvals tab but cannot generate or send estimates.

 

 

Article 4.5: Revoking an Estimate Link

If you need to revoke an estimate link — for example, if it was sent to the wrong person or contains incorrect information — you can delete it from the Customer Preview tab.

Steps:

  1. Go to the work order's Customer Approvals tab
  2. Click the Customer Preview tab
  3. Check the box next to the estimate link you want to delete
  4. Click the delete icon (trash can) in the top right corner
  5. Confirm the deletion

Required permission: The user must have the Manage Customer Portal Estimate Links permission enabled on their user profile.

Note: Deleting a link makes it inaccessible to the customer. If the customer has already accessed and submitted the estimate, the statuses that were applied will remain on the items.

 

 

Article 4.6: Customer Accidentally Rejected an Item

If a customer submitted an estimate and accidentally rejected an item, the rejection triggers automation within the work order line item. To reverse this, you need to update the work order item itself, not just the portal status.

Steps to Reverse a Rejected Item

  1. Go to the rejected work order item (not the Customer Approvals tab)
  2. Change the Item Status from "Rejected" to an open status
  3. In the item's Billing section, change the Owner Auth from "No" to "Yes" or "Open"
  4. Click Save

Note: You may also want to review and remove any automated rejection verbiage that was added to the Corrective Action field when the item was rejected.

Required permission: Config → User Profiles → [Select User Profile] → Access Levels → Work Orders → Item: Status - Finished/Rejected to Open. This permission allows users to change the status of an item back to an open status once it has been set to Finished or Rejected.

 

Aligning the Portal Status

After updating the work order item, you may also want to update the Portal: Customer Status to match. To do this:

  1. Go to the work order's Customer Approvals tab → Approval Items
  2. Click the edit pencil icon on the item
  3. In the edit modal, change the Portal: Customer Status to the desired value (e.g., Customer: Approved)
  4. Click Save

Required permission for portal status change: The user must have the Set Portal Item All Statuses permission enabled on their user profile (Config → User Profiles → [Profile] → Access Levels → Portal).

 

 

Article 4.7: Customer Approved but Status Not Updating in EBIS

If your customer reports that they approved items but the statuses in EBIS still show the previous state, check the following:

  1. Refresh the page. Refresh the Customer Approvals tab in EBIS. Status updates are real-time, but the page may need to be refreshed to display the latest data.

  2. Verify the customer clicked "Approve Estimate." This is the most common cause. On the customer-facing estimate, selecting approve or reject on individual items sets those as selections, but the estimate is not actually submitted until the customer clicks the Approve Estimate button at the very bottom of the page and confirms the dialog.

    1. If the customer made their selections but closed the page without clicking the Approve Estimate button, nothing was submitted. The customer can reopen the link and complete the process — their selections may still be in place.

  3. Check the Customer Preview tab. Look at the Signed Date and E-Sign columns. If the Signed Date is blank and E-Sign does not show "Yes," the customer has not yet submitted the estimate.

 

 

Article 4.8: Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use Customer Approvals with both Quotes and Work Orders? Yes. Customer Approvals works on both. If you start with a Quote, you can send the initial estimate, receive approvals, and then convert the Quote to a Work Order. The approval statuses carry over.

Does my customer need an EBIS account? No. Customers verify their identity using a one-time passcode sent to their email. No account creation is needed.

Can my customer access the estimate from their phone? Yes. The estimate link works in any browser on any device — phone, tablet, or computer.

Is the estimate link emailed to the customer automatically? No. When you create the estimate, you receive a shareable link that you copy and send to your customer via your preferred method (email, text, etc.).

How long is the estimate link valid? Each estimate link has an expiration date, visible on the Customer Preview tab. After the expiration date, the link will no longer be accessible.

Can I send multiple estimates to the same customer on the same work order? Yes. This is the core of the iterative findings workflow. Each time you send a new estimate, it captures only the new items that are at "Internal: Ready to Send." Previous estimates remain accessible and tracked on the Customer Preview tab.

What happens when a customer rejects an item? The item's status changes to "Customer: Rejected" in EBIS, and the rejected item automation is activated within the work order line item.

Can a customer change their mind after submitting? The customer cannot change their selections after submitting. However, a user with the "Set Portal Item All Statuses" permission can manually adjust the status of any item in EBIS.

What are the messaging notifications? When a customer sends a message on a line item, the shop is notified via the # Msg column on the Approval Items tab (as a blue hyperlink), the Messages module in the left navigation (with a red dot), and potentially the bell notification icon in the top right.

Where do I set up the Terms & Conditions text? Terms & Conditions are managed at Config → Lists → Instructions.

Where do I set the minimum deposit amount? Minimum deposit is set on the work order's Config & Billing tab. You can choose a flat amount or a percentage of the invoice.

 

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