How to Manage Document Access Across Teams with Custom Permissions

When teams work across departments, document access can become messy fast.

If access is too limited, collaboration slows down. Sales cannot loop in Legal quickly, Finance cannot review deal paperwork, and teams start finding workarounds. If access is too broad, sensitive documents become visible to people who should not see them.

BoldSign Custom Permissions help solve both problems. They let Account Admins give specific users or teams access to selected resources and actions without opening up the entire account. That means you can support cross-team work while keeping control over sensitive files.

What are custom permissions in BoldSign?

A custom permission let Account Admins override default role-based access and grant or deny specific actions for users or teams.

By default:

• Team Admins can manage resources within their own team
• Members can manage their own documents and templates
• Users cannot access documents from other teams unless permission is explicitly granted

With Custom Permissions, admins can allow or restrict actions such as:

• View Metadata
• View Document
• Edit
• Delete

This makes it possible to support collaboration across teams without removing existing security boundaries.

How roles work

BoldSign organization accounts support three main roles:

Primary Roles and Permissions

Account admin 

• Oversees the entire BoldSign account with full control over users, teams, and settings.
• Create, edit, and delete users and teams.
• Manage all documents, templates, bulk sends, and links.
• Grant or revoke Custom Permissions.
• Track permission history and audit logs.

Team admin

Manages a specific team or department. Limited by default to that team’s resources.

• Add or remove team members.
• Create, send, and track documents, templates, and bulk sends within their team.
• View and edit team-specific reports.
• Cannot access other teams’ documents without Custom Permissions.

Member

Standard user with the most restricted access, handling day-to-day eSignature tasks.

• Create, send, and manage their own documents and templates.
• View personal document history and reports.
• No access to team-wide or cross-team resources unless explicitly granted.

For more details on account roles and their privileges, check our article on Account roles and privileges in BoldSign.

Why custom permissions matter

Custom Permissions are useful when teams need to collaborate without exposing unrelated or sensitive information.

Common examples include:

• Letting Legal review contracts created by Sales
• Allowing Finance to access selected deal documents without exposing HR files
• Giving a team member view-only access to templates from another department
• Blocking a Team Admin from deleting certain completed documents

This approach helps organizations balance collaboration, security, and auditability.

What resources can admins control?

Custom Permissions can be applied to:

• Documents
• Templates
• Bulk Links
• Bulk Sends

Admins can grant or deny access for specific actions depending on the resource and user involved.

How to create a custom permission

Setting up a Custom Permission in BoldSign takes only a few steps.

• Go to Users & Teams from the dashboard.
• Select Custom Permissions.
• Click New Custom Permission.
• Choose the user or users who need access.
• Select the Entity Type, such as Documents, Templates, Bulk Link, or Bulk Send.
• Choose the team whose resources should be shared or restricted.
• Select the actions to allow or deny, such as View Metadata, View Document, Edit, or Delete.
• Set Access Type to Allow or Deny.
• Click Save.

How to deny access

Admins can also use Custom Permissions to block access.

For example, if a Team Admin should not be able to delete completed documents created by their team, an Account Admin can create a rule with Access Type = Deny for that action and resource.

This is useful when you want tighter control over sensitive or regulated workflows.

Enabling downloads for team documents

One important use case is download access. By default, Account Admins and Team Admins cannot download team documents, Bulk Link files, or Bulk Send documents unless the required permission is enabled. To allow downloads, admins must grant View Document access for the relevant team and resource type. This is useful for archiving, audits, and compliance reviews.

Managing and tracking permissions

Once Custom Permissions are in place, you can easily monitor and adjust them as your organization’s needs change.

• View history: Back on the Custom Permissions page, use the Filter button to search by user, team, or date. Apply filters to see granted and denied permissions and their history.
• Edit or delete: Select a permission record and click Edit to modify it, or Delete to revoke it. Deleting a Custom Permission cancels access immediately.

Conclusion: Elevate your workflow with precision

Custom Permissions in BoldSign turn rigid role-based defaults into a flexible, dynamic access management system. This enables secure collaboration without exposing unnecessary data. With these tools, Account Admins can block unauthorized access to other teams’ documents while still allowing trusted users to download and edit files where appropriate.

Ready to get started?

Sign up for BoldSign’s 30-day free trial and start using Custom Permissions today. Prefer a walkthrough? Schedule a demo with our team to see Custom Permissions in action.

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Note: This blog was originally published at boldsign.com