Having trouble logging in? No problem – I can help!
This page details how to log into mobileAgent, and what all the fields mean. Sorry it’s quite long, but I’ve tried to explain it in the most basic terms I can. As always, if you are still having problems logging in, drop me an email! I can’t respond to reviews in the appstore!
Known Bugs
There is one known bug in the login system. If you have non-english characters in your password (eg ß or ø – basically anything which isn’t A-Z, a-z, 0-9 and a few of the punctuation marks), it’s transmitted incorrectly, so FreeAgent thinks you have your password wrong. If you have anything slightly “strange”, try changing your password in FreeAgent to something simple like “pass1word”, see if you can log in with that. If so: chose something a little more secure, but without the “strange” characters. If not, keep reading.
Things you need to do before using mobileAgent for the first time.
There is only one thing: turn on API Access. This page details how you do that. This only needs to be done once.
What are all the fields on the login screen?
The first section is your domain and what service you use. mobileAgent works with FreeAgent and IRIS Openbooks – and the various other companies which rebrand or leverage off them. Which one you need to select is based on the URL in your browser when you log into FreeAgent / Openbooks. For example, my login url is
https://fastchicken.freeagentcentral.com
Yours might be
https://petangles.irisopenbooks.co.uk
The value to enter for domain is the first bit – fastchicken in my case, petangles in the other case. Select FreeAgent or IRIS Openbooks from the picker based on the rest of the URL.
There are some other options here: If you use a service which isn’t either of these (My Accountant Friend or My Business Works for example), email your provider or me and I’ll sort it out.
The next section has your username and password. This is what you use to log into the website with. This is normally your email address and a password.
If you use the Google Account option, or “Login with OpenID”, or start somewhere else and are autologged into FreeAgent, you will need to set a password in FreeAgent and use that in mobileAgent. This page details how you do that.
If you are not planning on using Dropbox to store your receipt images (not expense images, they are stored with FreeAgent), this is all you need to do. Hit the login button, and you should be able to login. If you want to use Dropbox, keep reading.
If you are still having a problem logging in, feel free to drop me an email.
The next section is your Dropbox login. Dropbox is a file-storage service, which allows you to keep files in sync over a number of machines, or upload files from various applications, like mobileAgent. Dropbox have a lot of information about themselves on their website.
MobileAgent uses Dropbox to store receipts. This lets you take a photo of a receipt – like you would when attaching a receipt image to an expense – and store it somewhere off your phone, so you have a single place to look when you are doing bank account reconciliation at the end of the month. This lets you treat things which are purchased on a company card in the same way you would for an expense which was purchased with your own card.
If you wish to use the Add Receipt function, but don’t want to use Dropbox, leave the Dropbox fields blank, and use the “Send via email” button on the Add Receipt screen. It will be sent as an email attachment.
To use Dropbox, you must first sign up with them if you don’t already have an account. It’s free, and you get 2GB of space to use for whatever you want.
Once you have signed up, use your Dropbox username and password – normally your email address – with mobileAgent, and the application can upload receipts for later use. The Path field is the folder where your receipts are stored in Dropbox. The default is Receipts, but you can name it whatever you want. If the folder doesn’t exist, it will be created.
If you are still having a problem logging in, feel free to drop me an email.
