Smartsheet Admin Center

Marisha90

Hello,

I unshared a user from all of our sheets about a month ago through the Admin Center. At one point, this user had Admin access on many sheets.

When I run the User Report, the user is still showing as Admin or Viewer on sheets they were unshared from. I’ve manually checked several of these sheets and confirmed they are not shared to the user anymore.

However, because the User Report still lists them on hundreds of sheets, it’s very difficult to confidently confirm that they no longer have access without checking each sheet individually.

At this point, I’m wondering if this is a reporting delay but it seems excessive or a glitch.

Does anyone have any experience with this?

Melissa Yamada

Yes — this is a known quirk with the User Report, and you’re not alone in seeing this.

What you’re running into is how the User Report sources its data, not an actual access issue.

What’s happening

• The User Report is not real-time and does not always immediately reflect unsharing actions, especially when the user previously had Admin-level access on many sheets.
• In practice, the report can continue to show historical sharing states for weeks (and sometimes longer), even after the user has been fully removed.
• This is especially noticeable when the user:
  • Was unshared in bulk via Admin Center
  • Had Admin permissions across a large number of sheets
  • Was later downgraded or fully removed

The important part

If you’ve manually checked multiple sheets and confirmed the user is not listed in the Share panel, then:

• The user does not have access
• The report is stale / lagging, not authoritative

Smartsheet has confirmed in past cases that sheet-level sharing is the source of truth, not the User Report.

Why it’s hard to verify

Unfortunately, there is no supported way today to force-refresh or rebuild the User Report, and there’s also no “effective access” report that validates access across all assets in real time.

Best practices to confidently confirm removal

Here’s what admins typically do in this situation:

• Trust the sheet share list, not the report
  If the user does not appear in the Share panel of a sheet, they do not have access.
• Spot-check strategically, not exhaustively
  Check:
  • Sheets where they were Admin
  • High-risk or sensitive workspaces
  • Recently modified sheets
• Document the admin action
  Keep a record that the user was removed via Admin Center on a specific date — this helps with audit confidence even if the report lags.

When to contact Smartsheet Support

If the User Report is still showing incorrect access months later, Support can:

• Confirm backend access state
• Flag the report inconsistency
• Validate that the user truly has no permission

TL;DR:
This is a reporting lag / limitation, not a security issue. The user does not have access if they’re not listed in the sheet’s Share panel, even if the User Report still says otherwise.

Hope that helps — this one trips up a lot of admins.