Creating Users & User Roles for Advisors

Study Notes:

The Interactive Brokers’ Advisor Portal allows a financial advisor to set up User Roles for their account that can be used as a template to define the access an employee has. Multiple user roles can be set up for different positions in the company and used as templates when employees are hired or change roles within the Advisory firm. For example, an advisor can set up a user role for the treasury department with only funding capabilities or an administrative employee that only needs reporting access. The access rights are organized into six categories. They are:

• User Setting Access which includes functions on the User Setting page related to receiving communication, logging in, security, and market data,
• Trading Access for TWS and setting trading limits,
• Reporting Access for statements, Delivery Settings, Portfolio Analyst, and Tax items,
• Funding Access which includes transferring funds, transferring positions, bank information, and transaction history,
• Account Settings Access for account configuration, profiles, financial information, and trading permissions, and
• Client Management Access and Client Security

How to create User Roles?

To create a new user role within Advisor Portal, click on the head & shoulders icon in the upper right-hand corner and select Settings in the drop-down panel. At the top of the Account Settings page, select the button for User Access Rights.

Once in the User and Access Rights page, click on the plus sign in the upper right-hand corner of the User Roles box. For this example, the Advisor is creating a User Role for a Junior Trading Employee who will use the Trader Workstation. Enter a name and then click continue.

The first page is User Setting Access page where there are 4 categories for Communication, Login, Security and Trading Platform. These access rights give the individual the ability to configure their unique settings such as modifying their email address, resetting their password, managing a two-factor authentication login device, or subscribing to market data.

When ready, click Continue to move on to the next page to set up Trading Access. For this example, the advisor will select TWS for access to the trading platforms.

Continuing to the next screen, the advisor can set Reporting Access for Statements, Other Reports, Settings, PortfolioAnalyst, and Tax. For this Junior Trading role, the advisor may want to select all the reports under Statements, Other Reports, and Portfolio Analyst, as well as the Tax Optimizer tool under Tax.

Continuing to the Funding Access page, the advisor can select the access rights pertaining to the ability to move money, transfer positions, view saved bank information and monitor transaction history. Since none of these rights are necessary in this example, the advisor will leave the boxes unchecked and click continue to Account Settings page. This page contains the ability for the employee user to modify the Account Configuration, Profile, and Financial Information for the master account. These rights tend to be more suitable for a compliance officer role or a senior staff member so they will not be selected in this example.

Clicking Continue, the advisor can choose whether the user should have access to Client Management tools such as adding client accounts and viewing client information.

When ready, the advisor clicks Continue and will see a summary of the access rights selected for the role and click Continue once more to create the user role. Once the User Role has been created, it can be used for multiple employees ensuring that the correct User Rights are assigned for each job title.

How to create a new user?

The advisor can create a new user to give an individual access to the system. Back on the User and Access Rights page, click the plus sign next to Users. First, the advisor will need to create a username and temporary password for the individual, and then choose whether the person is a security officer and/or an account representative.

Designating the person as a Security Officer will give them the ability to also create users and modify the access rights for existing users.

Designating the user as an account representative will allow them to be assigned to specific client accounts and listed on the reports as their representative.

Next, the advisor will enter the person’s contact information and choose whether they are an employee or not. Click continue and they’ll be asked whether they want to:

• Copy the User Access Rights of an existing user
• Use a role
• Create a new profile

In this case, the advisor chooses “Use a Role” and in the next screen selects Junior Trader role from the drop-down menu and clicks Continue. The User Settings Access screen will appear with the access rights pre-selected for that role. Using the menu drop down at the top, choose if the all the selected access rights are applied to:

• Master Accounts Only,
• Master and All Sub Accounts,
• Master and Specific Sub Accounts,
• All Sub Accounts, or
• Specific Sub Accounts

Or go to the drop-down box next to the individual access right to select the account(s). Repeat these steps through each of the six pages. When completed, the advisor may review the new user information and will receive a confirmation number to verify their identity prior to adding the user.

Depending on the user access rights that were selected, documents for proof of identity and residential address may be requested to verify the new person being added. Additionally, if trading access was selected, a Trader Authorization task will need to be signed. The primary user listed on the master advisor account will see these as Pending Items to complete under the notification bell icon.

Resources

User Access Rights Guide

User Access Rights Definitions

Advisor Portal User Guide