What "Seated" Means
A Seated client is one whose Builder Pro access you, the advisor, are paying for. You extend your subscription to cover their account; they get the full Builder Pro feature set at no cost.
What the Client Gets
A seated client has full Builder Pro access:
- Unlimited policies, deployments, and goals
- AI Insights and the AI Assistant in full data mode
- Document extraction
- All consumer tools
- Advanced analytics and CSV/PDF export
- Partner collaboration
Identical to what they would get if they subscribed to Builder Pro on their own.
The client does not see a Policy Stack charge on their payment method while seated. Their access is covered entirely by your advisor subscription.
What You Pay
Seats are part of your advisor plan. Each paid tier includes a baseline allowance:
- Practice Solo — 0 included client seats (clients self-pay or use Starter); no overflow purchasing
- Practice 10 — 10 included; overflow at $15/seat/mo
- Practice 25 — 25 included; overflow at $15/seat/mo
- Practice 50 — 50 included; overflow at $15/seat/mo
See Overflow Seats for the lifecycle of an overflow seat.
How Seats Connect to Billing
Your advisor plan bills on its regular cycle. Seat counts reconcile at billing time. If you add overflow mid-cycle, the prorated cost applies. If you remove a seat, the adjustment lands on the next billing cycle.
How a Seat Starts
Two paths, both supported by the Add Client dialog on Practice → Clients (and the same flow on Practice → Seats):
- Invite directly to a seat — generate a seat invitation. The client accepts it from their account and is seated on the spot. You can set a custom expiration on the seat at invite time.
- Add to CRM first, seat later — capture the contact in your CRM as Not Invited. Send a connection invitation when ready; once they accept, assign a seat from the Seats table.
The seat is independent from data-sharing. Even after a client accepts a seat, they may or may not enable data-sharing in their account — that's a second, independent decision they make. See Connected vs Seated for the dual-consent model.
Custom Expirations
When you send a seat invitation, you can override the default expiration for that one invitation. Useful when:
- You're offering a fixed-term trial as part of an annual review
- You want a hard end-date for a seated client whose engagement is being evaluated
- You're prepping for a re-up conversation and want the timing on the calendar
Set the default duration once in Settings → Seat Defaults (3, 6, 12, 18, or 24 months, or no expiration). Override per invitation as needed. You can also extend a seat in flight — click the expiration date on any assigned seat to extend it, change it, or remove the expiration.
What Happens When the Seat Ends
When a seat ends — manual revoke, downgrade-driven boot, cancellation, or payment-failure freeze — the client enters a 7-day Builder Pro transition window. They get an email immediately and a billing notice on login. If no self-pay subscription or other seat takes over, the account continues on Starter after day 7. A 20% off coupon for self-pay annual Builder Pro is included in the email.
See Seat Expiration and What the Client Sees for the full per-trigger breakdown.
Advisor Access While Seated
While the seat is active, you get a floor of read-only visibility for policies and loans — that data must be visible because you're paying for the Builder Pro account. Everything else — deployments, goals, tools, documents, read-write permission — remains controlled by the client through their data-sharing toggles. They can also disconnect entirely (which ends the connection but the seat can remain active).
When to Use Seats
Seats fit when you want to offer Builder Pro as part of your service. Clients who actively use Policy Stack tend to stay more engaged with their banking system — which benefits both parties.
See Connected vs Seated for the complete comparison.