Moving a license between you and a client

Assigning a license to a client keeps it on your account. Two flows move ownership itself, in opposite directions, and both need the other side’s approval from an email. Handing a license over gives one of yours to a client for good. The license, the order it was bought on and its site activations move to the client’s account. A transfer request asks a customer who bought their own licenses to hand them to your agency, so you can renew and manage them like the rest. This article covers both, plus the request that makes an existing customer your client without moving anything.

Handing a license over to a client #

If you only want a client to see and activate a license while you keep paying for it, assign it instead. A hand-over cannot be undone from your side. Only the new owner can hand the license back.

Before you start

• The license has to be one you own. A license a client already owns, or one that belongs to another agency, cannot be transferred.
• If the license is part of a bundle, transfer the bundle’s own license rather than one of the products inside it. The products inside a bundle move together with it.
• If the license renews on a subscription, handing it over stops that subscription (see below). Only the agency owner can hand over a license that renews on a subscription; a manager is refused.
• Your agency needs a name under Agency, then Settings, because the recipient sees it on the email that carries the link.

Start the transfer

1. Go to Agency, then Licenses, and click Transfer to client on the license card.
2. Under Who are you transferring it to?, choose the client from the list, or choose Someone else… and type their email address. The accept link goes to that address, and the license will belong to it. The page confirms which address it will email.
3. Decide whether to tick Keep it listed on my Agency page after they own it, which the next section explains.
4. Click Email the client to confirm.

The page tells you what becomes the client’s once they confirm: the product and its license key, the original order and any refund on it, anything bundled with it, and the renewal notices, which stop coming to you. The client receives an email from GravityKit, signed with your agency name. It says you have started transferring the license to them and carries a link that works for seven days and once. Until they accept, the license is still yours. The license card shows the pending transfer, and you can call it off from the same page.

What “Keep it listed on my Agency page” does

The box decides what you see after the hand-over, not what the client gets.

• Ticked: the license stays on your Licenses tab, filed under the client who received it, with the key masked and a note that they own it now. You can take it off your page later with Stop listing this. This is the usual choice when handing a license to one of your clients.
• Unticked: the license leaves your Agency area the moment the client accepts. You can still open the license’s transfer page to read the record of the hand-over. The license no longer appears on your Clients or Licenses tabs.

If you hand a license to someone who is not one of your clients, it leaves your client folders either way, because there is no client to file it under. The transfer record stays available to you as the agency owner.

What the client does

The email link opens a page on GravityKit headed Take ownership of this license?. It names the product, says the agency that bought it for them is handing it over, lists what moves, and says this cannot be undone from there. The client clicks Yes, it is mine now to take the license, or No, I do not want it to refuse it. Nothing happens on a bare click of the link, so they have to confirm on the page.

• The client does not need a GravityKit account first, because ownership follows the email address.
• If they decline, you are told by email, and the license stays yours with no changes.
• If they let the link expire, the page tells them the link has expired and to ask you for a new one. Start the transfer again to send one.
• If they open the link again after accepting, the page says the license is already theirs and there is nothing left to accept.

What moves when they accept

• The license and the order it was bought on move to the client’s account. Their receipts and invoices for it are theirs from then on.
• Any sites the license is activated on stay activated, so nothing on the client’s sites changes.
• If the license was assigned to one of your clients before, it is taken off that client.
• The client sees a confirmation that the license is now theirs, with a button to their GravityKit account.

Billing stops for subscription-backed licenses

A subscription is tied to the card and the account that set it up, so it cannot follow the license to a different account. When you hand over a license that renews on a subscription, GravityKit cancels that subscription as part of the transfer, and it cannot be reactivated afterwards. The paid-for time is not taken back: the license keeps its current expiry date, and the new owner renews it on their own account when it comes up.

The transfer form says so before you send. Your renewals stop when they accept, the client gets the license with the time you have already paid for, and nothing stops until they accept, so a request nobody answers costs you nothing. If you would rather keep the subscription running and have the client pay for it, do not hand the license over but send them a card-update link instead. Read Getting a client to pay.

When a transfer is refused

The form or the license page tells you why:

• The license belongs to a bundle. Transfer the bundle’s parent license instead.
• The subscription pays for more than one license on the same order. Stopping it would stop the others too, so that license cannot be transferred on its own.
• Only the agency’s billing owner can hand over a license that renews on a subscription. A manager can assign licenses but cannot stop billing.
• The license already belongs to that address. There is nothing to hand over.
• A transfer for this license is already waiting to be accepted. Call it off or wait for the client’s answer before starting another. An offer nobody answered stops blocking once it passes its deadline, and the form comes back on its own.

Calling a transfer off, and afterwards

While the client has not accepted yet, the license card offers Call off the transfer. Calling it off stops the emailed link from working and tells the client. Once the client has accepted, the transfer is finishing and cannot be called off any more, and the card offers See the transfer instead.

After the hand-over, a license you kept listed reads that the client owns it now and that you kept it listed. Get the client to pay and Get the client to update payment details are no longer offered on it, because the billing is theirs, while the license’s transfer page keeps the record. For a license that went to someone outside your client list, it reads A license you handed over, says the license has left your agency, and lists the transfer history. Your client sees the license on their own account with its full key, and can renew it there.

Bringing a client’s existing licenses into your agency #

Some clients bought their GravityKit licenses themselves before you started looking after their site. A transfer request asks them to hand those licenses over to your agency. The client stays in control: nothing moves until they approve it from an email, and they choose which licenses to hand over.

Send a request

1. Go to Agency, then Licenses, and click Ask a client to move licenses here.
2. On the Request a license transfer page, choose By email address and enter the client’s address, or By license key and enter one license key you already hold. A license key identifies the owner without you knowing their address. GravityKit finds the owner and never shows you the address.
3. Click Send request.

The request appears under Your requests on the same page, marked WAITING, with the date you asked and the date the link expires. Answered requests move to a list of their own below it. The page shows it that way whether or not the address belongs to a GravityKit customer, because GravityKit does not confirm whether an address exists. If the address owns nothing, the request simply expires unanswered.

The email goes out shortly after you send, within about a minute. It is worded by GravityKit, names your agency and the address you can be reached at, and carries a link that works for seven days.

What the client sees

The link opens a page headed Transfer licenses to <your agency>?. It lists the licenses on their email address, with keys masked to their last characters. Licenses bought together on one order move together, and a single tick covers the group. A license that cannot move, because it is on a subscription that pays for others or its order was refunded, is shown and explained rather than hidden. The client ticks what they agree to hand over and clicks Transfer the ticked licenses. They can also click No, keep everything on my account, with an optional reason that reaches you. Report this request is for a request from an agency they do not know. It asks them to confirm first, and then blocks your agency from contacting that address again.

On approval, the ticked licenses and their orders move to your agency’s account. Billing on the client’s side stops for any license that renewed on a subscription. The client sees a page confirming the licenses are now with your agency, and you get an email listing them. The licenses arrive unassigned, under My licenses, and approving does not make the person your client, so add them as a client and assign the licenses from the Licenses tab so they show on the client’s account again.

If the client declines, your request list shows it, with the reason if they left one. A report looks the same to you as a decline.

Making someone your client without moving licenses

When you try to add a client whose address already has a GravityKit account, the form offers Ask <address> to become your client. That is a transfer request with an extra question. On the approval page the client is asked whether your agency may look after licenses on their behalf. They can say yes and tick nothing, in which case they appear on your Clients tab with everything still on their own account. Or they tick licenses to hand those over at the same time.

Limits and calling a request off

GravityKit limits requests so that nobody is pestered: there is a number of requests per person and per agency per day, and a cap on requests waiting for an answer at once. Seven days have to pass before you can ask the same address again, whatever the answer was, and asking sooner is refused with the date you can ask again. Someone who reports your request cannot be asked again by your agency. While a request is waiting, Call it off on its row stops the emailed link from working. The client is not told, and the seven-day wait still applies.

Good to know #

• Handing over a license refunds nothing, because the paid-for time stays with the license and any refund would be on the order, which moves with the license to the new owner. If money needs to change hands between you and your client, that is between you.
• Assigning a license does not change who pays; only a hand-over does. Read Adding clients and giving them licenses.
• Removing a client does not undo a license you handed over to them. That license is theirs, and it stays theirs.

Related #

• Adding clients and giving them licenses
• Getting a client to pay
• Managing licenses for your clients with an agency account