13.3. What Clients See on Tickets: Status, Comments, Documents, and Notifications

Clients can view and interact with support tickets through the client portal. Visibility groups let an MSP limit access for individual contacts, while board settings control which boards and status changes are available. These restrictions are opt-in.

Limit ticket access with visibility groups

A visibility group belongs to a client and combines a selection of boards with a ticket visibility setting. Assign a group to a contact to control which of that client's tickets they can access.

Client admins retain access to all of their client's tickets on the group's selected boards, including tickets with no contact. They still cannot access a board that the MSP has hidden from the client portal. A group with no selected boards grants no ticket access.

For example, GreenLeaf Dental Group can place ordinary staff in a group using Only their own tickets, so one staff member cannot read another person's support request. Its client administrator can still oversee tickets on the group's allowed boards.

To configure this from the MSP app, use an account permitted to manage the contact's portal access:

1. Open Contacts, select the contact, and open Portal.
2. Under Visibility groups for client, enter a Group name, optionally add a Description, and select the Boards the group should access.
3. Under Ticket visibility, select Only their own tickets or All of this client’s tickets.
4. Click Create group, or Update group when editing an existing group.
5. Select the group in Ticket visibility group to assign it to the contact. Choose Full access to remove the group restriction.

Authorized client portal users can also manage these groups under Client Settings > Visibility Groups. Editing a group affects every contact assigned to it.

Before relying on contact-scoped visibility, check the Contact on tickets raised by technicians or integrations. A contact-scoped user cannot see a ticket raised on their behalf if no contact was assigned. Verify access using an ordinary portal account, including a ticket for that contact, a ticket for another contact, and one with no contact.

Board visibility and allowed status changes

In Settings > General > Ticketing > Boards, the MSP can turn off Visible in client portal under Display & behaviour to hide a board and its tickets from all portal users. A visibility group cannot override this restriction.

In the same board editor, under Priorities & statuses, turn off Client portal users can select this status for statuses reserved for the service desk. Clients still see their ticket's current status and can filter by it, but cannot move a ticket into a restricted status. Neither control changes which statuses MSP technicians can use.

For the configuration steps, see 10.5. Configure Ticket Numbering, Boards, Statuses, Priorities, and Categories.

What Clients See

When clients view a ticket, they can see:

• Ticket Number - The unique identifier
• Title - The ticket subject
• Status - Current state (New, Open, In Progress, Resolved, etc.)
• Priority - Urgency level with color indicator
• Due Date - Expected resolution date (if set)
• Assigned To - The technician or team assigned
• Description - Full ticket details
• Comments - All non-internal comments
• Documents - Files they are permitted to access; files on internal comments stay internal

External system links recorded by the MSP are not rendered in the client portal.

What Clients Can Do

• Create new tickets - Submit support requests directly
• Add comments - Communicate with your team on existing tickets
• Upload documents - Attach files, screenshots, or create documents
• Change status - Request changes to statuses the board allows portal users to select (with confirmation)
• Filter and search - Find tickets by status, priority, category, or keywords

Internal vs. Public Comments

When adding comments to tickets from the MSP application:

• Internal comments - Only visible to your team, hidden from clients
• Public comments - Visible to clients in the portal

Clients can only add public comments and can edit or delete their own comments.

Ticket Notifications

Clients receive notifications in the portal for:

• New comments on their tickets
• Ticket creation confirmations
• Status changes

Files attached to a client-visible comment are included with its notification email for every recipient authorized to receive them. If a file is too large for email delivery, the message contains a short-lived download link bound to that recipient. Files on internal comments stay internal. See 3.5. Add Internal, Client, and Resolution Comments and Attach Documents to Tickets for attachment delivery and comment handling.