Customer Portal: a guide for your customers

How to sign in to your hire company's customer portal, and what each of its pages tells you.

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For hire company staff: this page is written for your customers. You can send it to them as it stands.

Your hire company has a customer portal: a website where you can see the equipment you have on hire, its certificates, your deliveries and collections and, if you have been given access to it, your billing. This guide shows each page and what it tells you.

The pictures use an invented customer, Brightwater Civils Ltd, hiring from Example Hire Ltd. Your portal carries your own company's name, and your hire company's name, logo and colours, so it will look a little different. Nothing in the portal can be changed by you or by anyone else who signs in: it shows your hire company's records.

Getting in

You cannot register for the portal yourself. Your hire company invites you by email. The invitation says which account it is for and has a button, Open the customer portal. Keep the email, or save the portal's address in your browser.

You sign in with the email address the invitation was sent to, and a code that the portal emails you each time. There is no password to remember.

1
Enter your email address

Open the portal, type your email address and choose Continue.

2
Find the code in your email

A 6-digit code is emailed to you. It can take a minute to arrive. The email's subject starts "Your sign-in code for", followed by your hire company's name.

3
Type the code

Type the code on the page Check your email and choose Sign in. The code works for 10 minutes from when you asked for it, and only once.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The sign-in page. The name at the top is the hire company's. It asks for an email address and nothing else.
Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The page that follows, with the code typed in. It reads the same for every address, whether or not that address can use the portal.

You stay signed in, in that browser, for 30 days after your last visit. If you use the portal every week or so, you will rarely be asked for a code.

If no email arrives

If the code is not accepted

"That code is not right. Check the email and try again."
A slip in typing. Try again: the fifth wrong try ends the code.
"That code has expired or has been tried too many times. Send a new code."
The code is more than 10 minutes old, has been used already, has been replaced by a newer one, or has been tried wrongly five times. Choose Send a new code.
"Too many wrong codes have come from your network. Wait 15 minutes, then try again."
Many wrong codes have been typed from the internet connection you are on, which you may share with others at your office or site. Wait, then try again.
"This email address no longer has access to the portal."
Your access has been switched off or removed. If you think that is wrong, ask your hire company.

Signing out

Choose your name at the top right. Sign out signs you out of this browser. Sign out of all devices signs you out everywhere, which is the one to use if you signed in on a computer that is not yours.

Choosing an account

An account is one customer of your hire company. If you have one account, the portal opens it and you will not see this page.

If you look after more than one, for example two companies in a group, the portal opens the first. Choose Switch account, on the dark banner at the top of any page, to see Your accounts, and choose the one you want.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The accounts of a person who can see two customers. Each line gives the customer's name, its number and the hire company. The square shows the customer's logo, or its initials when it has none.

Access is given account by account. If an account you expect is missing, ask your hire company to add it.

Overview

The Overview is the first page of an account. Its heading says how many units you have on hire. The chart under it is the hire horizon: your hire over 12 weeks, from 8 weeks ago to 4 weeks ahead.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The Overview as it would read on 20 October 2026, for a person who can see billing. In a wide browser window the three small cards sit to the right of the chart. In a narrower one they come below it, as here.

Reading the chart

The bands
Each band is one of your sites. Its height shows how many units were there each day, so it steps up when equipment arrives and down when it goes back. By order and By type show a band for each order, or for each type of equipment, instead.
Today
The vertical line. Left of it is what has happened. Right of it, a dashed line carries today's number forward.
The units
Choose a band to open it. Each unit has a dark bar for the days it was with you. A bar that reaches Today is still with you. A unit's number opens its page. If you have one site, it is open already.
The line under a bar
The unit's certificates, day by day. Green: valid. Amber: running out. Pale green: covered by a certificate that has since been renewed. Dashed red: no valid certificate on those days.
The dots on a band
An amber dot marks the day a certificate runs out. It turns red once that day has passed.
Other weeks
If you had equipment before the first week shown, Earlier moves the chart back 4 weeks. Later and Back to today bring it forward again.
The Billing lane
Only if you have access to billing. A dot for each invoice in the 12 weeks, and to the right of Today the amount that is next to be invoiced.

The cards with the chart pick out what may need your attention. Certificates running out lists certificates of equipment you have on hire that are close to their expiry date or past it. Recent deliveries lists your five newest deliveries. If you have access to billing, Next to be invoiced shows the next amount to come.

Equipment

Equipment lists your units. On hire now is what you have today. Everything hired adds what you have had before and sent back, with the date it was returned.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The Equipment page, showing what is on hire now. The list is in order of site, then description. A unit's number opens its own page.
Unit no.
Your hire company's number for the unit. Choose it to open the unit's page.
Serial number
The maker's serial number, when the unit has one.
Site
Where it was delivered. Main address is your company's own address.
Order
The hire company's order number, with your own PO number under it when you gave one.
Out
The date it came to you.
Status
On hire, or Returned with the date it went back.
Certificate
How its certificates stand today: see Certificates.

To find a unit, type part of its number, its serial number or its description and choose Show. You can also narrow the list to one site, one order or one type of equipment. Clear filters shows everything again.

A unit's page

Choose a unit's number, here or anywhere else in the portal, to open its page.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. A unit's page: what it is, each time it was with the customer, and the certificates that covered it during that time.

Hire history lists each time you have had the unit, the newest first. Under it are the certificates that covered the unit while it was with you, with their files.

Certificates

Certificates brings the certificates of your equipment into one list. On hire now shows the current certificates of what you have today. Every certificate adds those of equipment you have sent back, and older certificates that have since been renewed. You see the certificates that were in force while the equipment was with you.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The Certificates page with Every certificate chosen, so that renewed certificates show beside the current ones. The most urgent is at the top. A file's name opens it.
Valid
In date.
Running out
Still in date, but close to its expiry date. Your hire company decides how many days ahead this starts.
Expired
Past its expiry date.
Renewed
Replaced by a newer certificate, which is in the list too.

The most urgent certificates are at the top. You can search by unit number, serial number, certificate number or reference, and narrow the list by site, order, type of certificate and status.

Downloading a certificate

In the Files column, choose a file's name. A PDF opens in your browser, where you can save or print it. Any other kind of file downloads. No files means that no document has been attached to the certificate: ask your hire company for it.

If you read "We couldn't fetch this file" in place of the file, try again in a few minutes.

Downloading many at once

A certificate pack is one zip file of many certificates, with a folder for each unit and a list of what is in it, Certificates.csv, which opens in a spreadsheet. You can ask for one in four places:

The portal then opens a page for the pack and prepares it. The page says how far it has got and updates itself every 10 seconds, so you can leave it open. When the pack is ready, choose Download the pack.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. A certificate pack that is ready to download. While the pack is being made, the same page says how far it has got.

Deliveries

Deliveries lists equipment coming to you and going back, the newest first. A delivery is equipment brought to you. A collection is equipment returned. Everything, Deliveries and Collections choose which are listed.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. One collection and one delivery, the newest first. A document's number opens its page.

To find a document, search for its number, or for the number or serial number of a unit on it. You can also narrow the list to one site or one order. Choose a document's number to open it.

A delivery's page

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. A delivery's page. The two buttons give the delivery note as a PDF, and the certificates of the units on the delivery.

The page gives the date, the site and its address, the contact, the order, your PO number and what was delivered, line by line. A unit's number opens its page.

A collection's page shows what went back in the same way. It has no delivery note. A unit that did not come back is marked Lost, and a line that was cancelled is struck through.

Billing

The Billing tab is there only if your hire company has given you access to billing. It is given person by person, because not everyone who needs to see the equipment needs to see the invoices. If you need it and have no Billing tab, ask your hire company for billing access.

Illustration. The real screen can differ in detail. The Billing page: one invoice still to pay and not yet due, and October's hire, which can be invoiced from the end of the month. The Status column of Open items stays empty unless an item is overdue.
Balance
What you still have to pay. Any part that is overdue is in red under it. Nothing to pay. means just that.
Next to be invoiced
The amount of your next invoice, the period it covers, and the day from which it can be invoiced.
Open items
Each invoice still to pay, the soonest due first. A credit, or a payment not yet set against an invoice, is listed too and takes the balance down. An item past its due date is marked Overdue.
The next 12 months
What will be invoiced on your orders, period by period, if nothing changes. The periods marked Next make up your next invoice.
Invoices and credit memos
Your invoices and credit memos, the newest first, each marked Paid, Open or Overdue. A credit memo that has been set against an invoice or refunded is marked Used.

To download an invoice or a credit memo, choose its number in the Document column. It opens as a PDF in your browser, where you can save or print it. You can search the list by document number, PO number, reference or order.

How fresh the information is

The portal copies your information from your hire company's system every 15 minutes. Under each page's heading, a line such as Updated 3 minutes ago says how old the copy is. Something that happened in the last few minutes, such as a delivery just made, may not show yet.

Refresh now asks the portal to fetch the latest at once. The page then tells you what happened:

"Up to date"
The portal has just fetched the latest.
"Already up to date"
It fetched less than a minute ago, and does not fetch more often than that.
"The portal is already reading"
It is fetching at this moment. Try again in a minute.
"The portal could not read"
It could not reach your hire company's system. What you see is still right as of the time in the Updated line. Try again later.

The first time you sign in to a new account, the portal may still be fetching it. The page says so, and the information appears within a minute or two.

If something is not right

No sign-in email
See If no email arrives, above.
"Page not found"
The link you followed is to something your access does not cover, or that is no longer there. Go back to the Overview. If you think you should be able to see it, ask your hire company.
Something is missing
Choose Refresh now. If a unit, a delivery or a certificate is still missing, tell your hire company: the portal shows what they have recorded.
Something looks wrong
A date, a site, a status or an amount cannot be corrected in the portal. Tell your hire company. When they correct their records, the portal follows.
A certificate has expired, or has no file
Ask your hire company for the current certificate.
No Billing tab
Ask your hire company for billing access.
A file or a PDF will not open
Try again in a few minutes. If the page says the document could not be produced, ask your hire company for a copy.
"Something went wrong"
Try again in a minute. If it keeps happening, tell your hire company and give them the reference shown on the page.
"You have no accounts right now."
Your access to every account has been switched off or removed. If you think that is wrong, ask your hire company.
A colleague needs access, or has left
Ask your hire company to invite them or to remove them. Each person signs in with their own email address, so there is nothing to share and no password to change.