User Subscription Model (USM) Users Who Have Had a Provisional Period

I am trying to create communication and training resources as we prepare our transition to USM.

Do I understand the USM articles correctly - if a user who has already had a provisional period is later shared at a higher permission level, it will automatically put them into a provisional status again? Does the system automatically detect if the user has had provisional status before and automatically assign them to Member status?

Or will any user who’s status change basically get a provisional period until the next true-up? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of telling users they only get ONE provisional period?

We are trying to implement a policy that no External User can be a Member. During True-up we will downgrade any external provisional members to Guest-Editors. The concern is once we downgrade the external user to a Guest, if an asset is shared at Admin level, people will learn for that period up to true-up, that external user has admin permissions. This will be a nightmare for data governance and security if we’re not able to manage this more closely or at least build automations or be alerted when this occurs at a minimum.

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Nathan Malone

Thank you Trang for your question!

At this time, there is no in-product mechanism that forces a user to be automatically upgraded to a paid Member when they become a Provisional Member for the second time. However, downgrading repeatedly to avoid payment is against our terms & conditions, and Smartsheet reserves the right to invoice if there is significant evidence that gamification is occurring.

We have received the request to build automatic assignment of new seat types which we are currently scoping with internal teams that could potentially apply to your situation with external Guests. We hope to have an update for you in the near future.

Trang Turtletraxx

@Nathan Malone Will the True up Admin console indicate if a user has been through a provisional period in the past?

The way we intend to set up our process is provisional Members will receive a notification to complete a User Choice form to choose whether they want to downgrade to Viewer or upgrade to Member after the provisional period ends.

If a 2nd time provisional Member submits a form to downgrade, how do we (System Admins) know if a user has had a provisional status before? What happens if we downgrade them to Viewer?

Nathan Malone

Yes, admins are able to see how many times a user has been previously demoted from Provisional Member to Viewer.

Trang Turtletraxx

@Nathan Malone I appreciate your responses. We are not on USM yet. Would you happen to have a screen shot you can send me of what that looks like and where we would find that?

When you say "how many times a user has been previously demoted" it makes me think users can be demoted more than once. I was told users can only be in provisional status ONCE. I know there are automations Smartsheet does during true-up if we don't change anything. If we demote a user and s/he's had a provisional status, does Smartsheet automatically change them to a Member during true-up?

Nathan Malone

@Trang Turtletraxx Right now, there's not an in-product mechanism that forces a provisional Member to become a Member the second time they become provisional. Therefore, at the current time, you don't have to worry about someone being forced into becoming a Member without oversight from a System Admin. Keep in mind, however, that if there is evidence that someone is becoming provisional time and time again to avoid payment—Smartsheet reserves the right to invoice.

Pauline J

@Nathan Malone

I'm responding here b/c I have a pretty urgent need for assistance with our subscriptions. I reached out to support, and to our rep and his manager, but I really need help ASAP. Smartsheet changes occured on the bac kend two days ago — people who should have a license now are Viewers. Ownership has been transferred and we have a critical project that is time-sensitive and the person who should be the Owner is not, and cannot be made the Owner. As the SS Admin I cannot make any changes in the TrueUp until the end of the month — this is not acceptable. We need to be able to manage our people and our licenses; this transition to the new model has been challenging for your users — to have behind the scenes decisions made by SS after the months of this process being stalled, without the abiity for Admins to adjust, or confirm, is distressing; we have had personnel changes; we need to be able to set the licenses to the right people!

Trang Turtletraxx

We were told user types can be changed at any time through the admin center during non true up times. Is that no longer true?

Piotr Stukin

@Trang Turtletraxx @Pauline J
I recently noticed changes in our Smartsheet account. We have 93 paid licenses, but 86 additional users were added as provisional members, set to convert to paid next cycle. I need to contact them or review usage reports to determine if they can be downgraded to Viewers.

Additionally, many users' statuses changed from Owner to Viewer, and I can’t find a way to revert this. I can only change from Viewer to No Access.
Also, ALL former employees are listed as Viewers in True-App under Users. This is a mess. Any advice?

Trang Turtletraxx

@Piotr Stukin I'm no expert and we haven't converted to USM, but my understanding is there are two (2) things need to occur to enter provisional status:

A user is shared an item at a paid Member permission level. This puts the user in a “viewer-like” status with to perform certain Member actions.
The user in “viewer-like” status takes a Member capable Qualifying Action across any asset in the last 90 days puts them into provision status, becoming a Provisional Member.

It is possible your Owners haven't logged any activity in the Past 90 days.

From what I understand, they stay in the "viewer like" status until that 2nd criteria is met. Once they are in provisional status is when they will be on your list to manage whether it's upgrading or downgrading user types.

Trang Turtletraxx

@Nathan Malone do you know if a user who has already had a provisional period and is upgraded to provisional status again, if (during True-up) the Viewer option will be available? I know this is a loophole, but was curious if Smartsheet even allows us to select Viewer if the user has already had a provisional period and is provisional status again.

Joevania Alexandre

How?

Joevania Alexandre

I have several concerns/suggestions regarding the User Subscription Model.

-Suggestion: Reporting doesn’t currently allow us to see how frequently people are using their account (not just the last login) and their activity (whether viewing, editing, creating new sheets/reports/dashboards). A comprehensive activity report by license type would be really helpful and also on the True Up page (activity ie edit or view, frequency of logging in, ownership of sheets, any groups they are a part of) to help us identify who should retain a member license or be downgraded to viewer.

-Concern: “Guest” users can have their license from external org yet still require a license from us to make edits. So essentially users can have multiple licenses from multiple organizations. This seems like double dipping for Smartsheet and not a customer centric approach at all.

- Suggestion: It would be helpful to be a able to assign and update licenses for groups in bulk. For example, if there are people who require a license for a short period of time, such as a testing window for a project, we can group them together to issue the member licenses and downgrade their status to viewer more efficiently rather on an individual basis.

Trang Turtletraxx

Regarding your first suggestion - there is an add-on feature that provides granular details for each user called Event Reporting.

Regarding your concern - I don't see the Guest user model as a concern. Unless a Guest needs Admin or Owner permissions to an asset they are a guest on a plan for free. I believe licensing should be plan specific. This mitigates the risk of users being able to create and own assets under a plan without the business being able to manage that user like the legacy model currently allows. Because an external user/Guest has a license on another plan, they are able to create and own assets on any plan they are shared to but the user never appears on the user management report so access can NOT be revoked because they retain ownership of assets.

Regarding your 2nd suggestion - I can't speak to the group suggestion. I am not a fan of groups because of the difficulty to manage all the users and various permission levels. We turned on the control that only allows users under our plan to be in groups but even then it is not realistic under USM to ensure users are not automatically upgraded because they are shared in a group vs their individual User Type.

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