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Team members & roles

Platybooks workspaces can hold more than one person, so you can bring colleagues into the same set of clients, quotes, invoices and payments. This article covers inviting teammates, how they accept, what each role can do, changing roles, removing people, leaving a workspace, and how many people your plan allows.

Inviting a teammate

You manage your team from Settings, in the Team card. Only owners and admins see the invite form and can add people; members see the list of who's in the workspace but can't change it. You can invite by email and, once an invitation exists, also share a direct link.

An invitation is created at a role you choose. If you're an admin you can invite people as Admin or Member; only an owner can invite someone as an Owner. Each pending invite shows the role and an expiry date, and you can re-send, copy its link, or revoke it at any time.

  • Settings shows the Team card with an "Invite by email" field and a role dropdown.
  • Owners can pick Owner, Admin or Member; admins can pick Admin or Member.
  • New invitations expire after 7 days; re-inviting the same address refreshes the link and resets the clock.
  • Each person also gets an invite email automatically, so they don't strictly need the copied link.

How to invite someone

  1. Open Settings and find the Team card.
  2. Type the teammate's email address in the "Invite by email" field.
  3. Choose their role from the dropdown next to it (Member, Admin, or — if you're an owner — Owner).
  4. Click Invite. You'll see an "Invitation created" confirmation and the person appears under "Pending invitations".
  5. An invite email is sent automatically. If you'd rather share it yourself, click Copy link next to the pending invite and send that link directly.

Accepting an invitation

When someone opens their invite link they land on a join page showing the workspace name and the role they've been offered. They accept while signed in as the exact email the invite was sent to — the workspace checks the address matches before letting them in.

If they're not signed in yet, the page offers "Email me a sign-in link". That magic link returns them to the same invite page after they sign in, where they finish with "Accept invitation" and are taken straight into the workspace. An invite that has expired, been revoked, or already accepted will say it's no longer valid, and signing in under a different email address shows a clear mismatch message.

  • The invitee must use the same email address the invitation was sent to.
  • Not signed in yet? Use "Email me a sign-in link", then return to the page to accept.
  • Expired, revoked, or already-used links can't be accepted — ask an owner or admin to send a fresh one.

The three roles and what each can do

Every workspace has three roles, in increasing order of access: Member, Admin, and Owner. Higher roles include everything the lower ones can do.

Members run the day-to-day document work. Owners and admins add the financial and administrative controls on top. A few owner-only powers — chiefly anything to do with owners and the billing plan — are reserved so the workspace always has someone fully in charge.

  • Member: create and manage clients, products, quotes and invoices, send documents, and generate payment links — the everyday work.
  • Admin: everything a member can do, plus recording manual payments and refunds, editing org settings and branding, and managing the team (inviting, changing roles, and removing members).
  • Owner: everything an admin can do, plus managing other owners (promoting to or demoting from Owner) and changing the subscription plan. Only an owner can do these.
  • Recording a manual payment or a refund on an invoice requires owner or admin — members won't see that option.

Changing roles and removing people

In the Team card, owners and admins can change a member's role from the dropdown beside their name, or remove them with the trash icon. The change saves immediately and the person's access updates right away.

The rules protect the workspace's chain of command. You can't change your own role or remove yourself from this list (use Leave instead). Admins can manage members and other admins but not owners — only an owner can promote someone to Owner, demote an owner, or remove an owner. And the workspace will never let you remove or demote the last remaining owner, since every workspace needs at least one.

  • Use the role dropdown next to a person to change their role; use the trash icon to remove them.
  • Admins can manage members and admins; only owners can touch owner accounts.
  • The system blocks any action that would leave the workspace with no owner.
  • Removing someone revokes their access immediately — re-inviting them later restores it.

Leaving a workspace

At the bottom of the Team card is "Leave this workspace". Leaving removes you immediately — you lose access to that workspace's clients, documents and payments, and can only return if an owner or admin invites you back. You'll be asked to confirm before it happens.

If you're the only owner, the Leave button is disabled. Hand ownership to someone else first by promoting another member to Owner, or, if you're closing things down entirely, delete your account. (If you do delete your account as the sole owner of a workspace that still has other members, the longest-standing teammate is automatically promoted to owner so the team keeps the workspace.)

  • Find "Leave this workspace" at the bottom of the Team card and confirm in the dialog.
  • A sole owner can't leave — promote someone to Owner first.
  • Leaving is immediate; you can only rejoin via a new invitation.

Seats and plan limits

How many people can be in a workspace depends on its plan. A pending invitation counts toward the limit too, so re-sending invites doesn't let you sneak past the cap.

When you've hit the limit, the invite form is replaced by a prompt to upgrade. Changing the plan is an owner-only action, done from Settings → Billing.

  • Free: 1 seat (just you).
  • Starter: 2 seats.
  • Pro: 5 seats.
  • Business: unlimited seats.
  • Members plus still-pending invites both count toward your seat total.

Frequently asked questions

What's the difference between an admin and an owner?

Admins can do almost everything: invite and remove teammates, change member and admin roles, record manual payments and refunds, and edit org settings and branding. The owner-only powers are managing other owners (promoting to or demoting from Owner) and changing the subscription plan. Every workspace must always keep at least one owner.

My teammate says they can't accept the invite — what's wrong?

The most common causes are that they're signed in with a different email than the one the invite was sent to, or the invite has expired (invites last 7 days), been revoked, or already been used. They need to sign in with the exact invited address. If the link is no longer valid, an owner or admin can simply send a fresh invitation from Settings → Team.

Can a member record payments or change settings?

No. Members handle clients, products, quotes and invoices — including sending documents and creating payment links — but recording manual payments or refunds, editing org settings, and managing the team all require owner or admin. Those controls don't appear for members.

I'm the only owner and want to leave. How?

You can't leave while you're the sole owner, because the workspace always needs one. First promote another teammate to Owner from the Team card, then leave. If you intend to shut everything down, deleting your account will remove you — and if other members remain, the longest-standing one is automatically made owner so they keep the workspace.

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