Preview the portal as a customer
Open a read-only view of exactly what one portal contact sees, from an account or a shipment — for support calls and for checking what you have shared.
When a customer says "I can't see the document", the fastest answer is to look at their portal yourself. View portal as customer opens a read-only session showing exactly what that contact sees — nothing more, nothing less.
Where to start it
- From an account. Open the account and use View portal as customer in the portal-access panel. If the account has several portal contacts, you pick whose view to open.
- From a shipment. The parties section on a shipment offers the same control next to each party that has portal access, so you can go straight from the file in question.
If no control appears, that account has no active portal contact — see Invite a customer to the portal.
What the preview is
A banner across the top names the account you are viewing and stays there for the whole session. The session is read-only: every control that would change something is disabled, documents cannot be downloaded, and messages cannot be posted. You are looking, not acting.
It is scoped to that contact, not to you. What you see is what their party role and account allow — so it is a true answer to "what can they see", not an approximation.
Sessions last 15 minutes. When one expires the portal says so and offers to start another, which returns you to the same file you were on.
Leaving
Exit preview in the banner returns you to the page you started from. Every preview is recorded in the audit trail with who started it, which contact was previewed, and when.
If it refuses to start
If your own user also holds portal access in this workspace, preview cannot run from your session and says so. Ask an admin to revoke your portal access (Account → Portal access → Revoke), then start it again.