B2B Edition User Roles and Permissions

With B2B Edition, you can create user accounts for your staff, giving them access to the B2B Edition control panel, specifying what actions they can take, and assigning specific Company accounts that they can manage. The predefined user roles in B2B Edition provide permissions for your staff to perform the day-to-day tasks of managing a B2B store, but you can also configure custom user roles with specific permissions.

You user account must have the following permissions to manage the following aspects of B2B Edition users and roles:

• To create and edit user accounts in B2B Edition:
  • View Users
  • Add New User
  • Update User
  • Delete User
• To manage users assigned as Sales Staff:
  • View Sales Staff
  • Company/View Sales Staff
  • Company/View Company
  • Edit Sales Staff
  • Edit Company
  • Import Sales Staff
  • Export Sales Staff
• To create and edit user roles:
  • View Roles
  • View Role
  • Edit Role
  • Manage Default Role
  • Add New Role
  • Delete Role

When you have set up B2B Edition in your store, the BigCommerce store owner user is automatically assigned the Store Owner role in B2B Edition. You can create and manage B2B Edition user accounts, also known as system users, from Settings › System users and roles in the B2B Edition control panel.

System users and roles settings are organized into the following tabs:

• Users — Manage system user accounts. This tab is further divided into the following subsections:
  • All — View all system user accounts.
  • Sales staff — View system users assigned a “Sales Staff” user role.
• Roles — View existing user roles, and create or edit custom user roles with unique permissions.

In order to access B2B Edition in the control panel, BigCommerce users must have the correct permissions in their user account. Once assigned, they can automatically generate a B2B Edition user account with a default user role, or you can create a user account for them with a different role. When a user is invited, they will receive an email from noreply@bundleb2b.com with a link to create a password and sign in to the B2B Edition control panel.

B2B Edition includes a comprehensive set of permissions that restrict what a user can view, edit, and delete in the B2B Edition control panel. Rather than assigning permissions to each user account as with BigCommerce user accounts, B2B Edition permissions are assigned to user roles, which you can then apply to your users as needed. While the permissions in the predefined user roles cannot be changed, you can create custom roles with unique permissions.

In addition to permissions, you can designate certain user roles as “Sales Staff” roles. When a user is assigned as Sales Staff, any permissions enabled in their user role only apply to Company accounts they are approved to see. This is helpful if you have a team of sales representatives that each manage distinct subsets of your B2B clients.

Before adding a user to B2B Edition, you must first configure their BigCommerce user permissions to access the B2B Edition control panel. Note that only the store owner, or users with the Manage Users, Edit Users, and Add Users permissions, will be able to modify user accounts in the control panel.

Go to Account Settings › Users and select Edit from the action menu of the user you wish to add, or create the user account if it isn’t there already. Scroll down to Single Click Apps, then check the box next to B2B Edition.

Once the BigCommerce user account has the correct permissions, you can create a user account in B2B Edition via the self-service or manual creation methods.

Self-Service Account Creation

After they have been assigned the B2B Edition permission, a BigCommerce user can generate their own B2B Edition account by navigating to Apps › B2B Edition in the BigCommerce control panel. B2B Edition will automatically create a user account using their BigCommerce user email address.

This user account is automatically assigned the default user role configured in the Roles tab of Settings › System users and roles, and users with the appropriate permissions can edit the user’s account information at any time from Settings › Users.

Manual Account Creation

If you would prefer to specify a user’s account information before they have access to B2B Edition, go to the Users tab of Settings › System users and roles in the B2B Edition control panel and click Add User. This action is available in the All and Sales staff subsections.

Fill out the user’s contact details, specify whether you want their account to be active or inactive, and assign a user role. When assigning a Sales Staff role to users, there are additional user fields that must be filled out.

Click Save to send an invite email to the email address previously entered for the user account. Note that new users set as inactive will still receive the invite email, but will be unable to log in after setting their password.

To edit a user in B2B Edition, go to the Users tab of Settings › System users and roles. Locate the user account in the list, sort the user list by clicking on the header of an information column, or use the search bar at the top to find a user by their name or email address. Select Edit from the action menu to open the Edit user window.

Edit the information in the following fields. Note that a user’s email address cannot be changed.

• Name — the user’s full name
• Phone Number — the user’s phone number
• Status — specifies whether or not the user can log in to their account. Select Active to allow the user access to the B2B Edition control panel, or Inactive to temporarily disable the user account.
• Role — select a predefined or custom user role to specify the user’s permissions

Sales Staff are system users that can only view and interact with Company accounts they are assigned. This is determined by the user role assigned to the user and can be configured using the built-in Sales Rep role, or by creating a custom role specified as Sales Staff.

To manage users assigned as Sales Staff, navigate to the Sales staff subsection of Settings › System users and roles. From here, you can view the number of Company accounts assigned to users, sort them by clicking on the header of an information column, and search by name or user role.

When you select a Sales Staff role while creating or editing a user account, you can then use the Assign companies settings to select which Company accounts the user has access to. You can filter the Companies by whether or not they are currently assigned to the user, or locate specific Companies by using the search bar.

You can also assign Sales Staff when editing a Company from the Sales Staff tab. Select All or Unassigned from the dropdown and select the Sales Staff users you want to assign to the Company account. You can also narrow the list of users by name or email address the search bar.

To assign existing Sales Staff to Companies in bulk, import them to your B2B Edition control panel. Note that new Sales Staff users cannot be created via CSV import.

The roles you assign to your users allow you to control what actions they can take within the B2B Edition control panel. The following roles are available by default:

• Sales Rep — can only view and manage the compan details, orders, and quote requests of Company accounts assigned to them. Sales Reps cannot access users, roles, or settings in the B2B Edition control panel.
• Accountant — can view and export invoicing data, such as invoiced orders and invoice payments, but cannot create or edit them.
• Financial Manager — can manage all aspects of invoicing data, including the ability to create and edit invoice payments.
• Administrator — can access all Company account information and manage users, roles, and settings. There can be more than one Administrator user.
• Store Owner — assigned by default as the store owner user in the BigCommerce control panel. The Store Owner has access to all areas of the B2B Edition control panel. There can be only one user assigned as Store Owner.

To manage your user roles, go to the Roles tab of Settings › System users and roles in the B2B Edition control panel. The available roles are labeled as Predefined (available by default) or Customizable (manually created). Click the information columns to sort your user roles list by name or type.

To define the user role you want assigned by default to automatically-created user accounts, click Manage default user role, then select the role from the drop-down list.

From a user role’s action menu, you can View and Edit a custom role’s permissions, or Delete a role. Predefined roles cannot be edited or deleted.

To add a new custom role, click Create role.

Name your custom role and check the boxes next to the permissions you want to enable, or check the box next to Permissions to enable all of them.. If you set the user role as a Sales Staff role, users assigned to the role will only be able to view and manage Company accounts that are assigned to them. The Sales Rep role is set as a “Sales Staff” role by default.

Click Save when you’re done, then assign the new role to any desired users.

The table below lists the available permissions in B2B Edition. The Requires column indicates any prerequisite permissions that must be enabled in order to assign a particular permission to a user role. Note that while creating or editing a custom user role, checking the box next to a permission will automatically enable any prerequisite permissions.

What is the difference between Sales Staff and Super Admin users?

Sales Staff users manage relationships with Companies from your B2B Edition control panel, while Super Admins assist Company users within their storefront Buyer Portal. See Assigning Super Admins and Sales Staffin Companies to learn more.

How do I delete a user account?

To delete a user account in B2B Edition, go to the Users tab of Settings › System users and roles and select Delete from the user’s action menu.

Note that a user account cannot be recovered after deleting it. If you want to temporarily prevent a user from accessing B2B Edition without having to manually recreate their account, edit their account and set it as Inactive instead.

How do I change which user has the Store Owner role?

While logged in as the current store owner user, go to the Roles tab of Settings › System users and roles in the B2B Edition control panel and edit the user you would like to assign as store owner. Select Store Owner from the Role dropdown and Save your changes.

After reassigning the store owner, the previous store owner will be assigned the Administrator role. Note that this does not affect who is assigned as the BigCommerce store owner. If the current store owner user does not have access to the BigCommerce control panel, contact our Support team and they can assist you with changing the store owner user.

Can I create user accounts in bulk?

No, user accounts can only be created individually in B2B Edition.

Can I configure storefront permissions for Super Admin users?

Super Admins automatically have the Admin Buyer role when they log in to a Company account. However, their Buyer role and permissions cannot be altered. See Super Admin Masquerade in Order Management and Sales Representative Functions for more information.

Why are my Sales Staff users able to see information from Companies outside of their list of assigned Companies?

If you’ve designated a user role as “Sales Staff” and also enabled permissions for creating or editing Super Admins, users assigned that role will see all Company accounts in your store while configuring Company assignment for new or existing Super Admins.

This only applies to the Super Admins area of the B2B Edition control panel; Sales Staff users can only see their assigned Companies from the Companies area.