Copying a user (inherit permissions)

What you'll learn#

• When copying is better than creating from scratch
• What the copy inherits — and what you still fill in manually
• Step-by-step through the Copy User dialog
• Common patterns for using copy effectively

When to copy versus when to create#

Copy is the right choice when:

• You're adding a new person to an existing role that another teammate already fills well (e.g., onboarding your third finance reviewer — copy from one of the existing two).
• You've set up a dedicated template user — an account created specifically to be cloned for new hires of a given type.
• You want the new user to have the same companies and per-resource access as an existing user, without manually re-configuring each setting.

Create from scratch is the right choice when:

• The new user has a unique setup nobody else matches.
• You want a clean starting point (just the default role-level access) and will configure the details yourself.
• No existing user really matches — copying from a "close enough" person often results in access overrides you didn't want.

What the copy inherits#

When you copy a user, the new account starts with:

• The role from the source user (pre-filled; you can change it before saving).
• The primary company from the source user (pre-filled; you can change it).
• The full list of companies the source user belongs to.
• The per-resource access overrides (ACLs) configured for the source user.

What the new user gets fresh:

• Their own username (you pick it; must be unique).
• Their own name and email.
• Their own initial password (you set it).

In short: personal identity is new; access setup is cloned.

Step-by-step#

1. Open Settings → Users.
2. Find the user you want to copy from. Use the search box if needed.
3. Click the three-dot menu at the end of their row.
4. Choose Copy User.
5. The dialog opens with the title "Copy user {source name}". The Role and primary Company fields are already filled in from the source.
6. Fill in the new user's identity:
   • Username — unique, the new person's sign-in name.
   • First Name / Last Name — the new person's name.
   • Email — their email address.
   • Password — a strong initial password.
7. Review the pre-filled Role and Company. Change either if the new user needs something different from the source.
8. Click Copy User (the submit button label changes for copy mode).

The new user appears in the Users list immediately, with the source user's full permission setup already in place. No additional configuration needed unless you want to change something specific.

A useful pattern: template users#

Some admins set up dedicated template users — accounts that aren't assigned to a real person but exist purely to be copied. For example:

• template.finance-reviewer — Operator role, assigned to Finance group, has read access across Document Flow
• template.department-admin — CompanyAdmin role, assigned to no group
• template.read-only-auditor — ReadOnly role, no group, email points to an auditor mailbox

When a new hire matches one of these profiles, copy from the template, give them a real identity, and they're ready in one minute.

Common questions#