Understanding Service Accounts

A Service Account is the record of one specific account you hold with a company — the electric account for one property, or one of two cell phone lines with the same carrier. It keeps the account number, the type of service, and that account's documents together in one place.

Every Service Account belongs to a company contact. It isn't a page of its own in Finance or Property, and it isn't a separate row on your Contacts list — you'll always find it inside the company it's with.

To open one:

1. Go to Contacts.

2. Open the company (for example, your electric utility).

3. Under Service Accounts, select the account you want.

You'll see that Service Account's account number, the type of service, and the files stored on it — for example, monthly bills or your annual contract.

If a company doesn't have any Service Accounts yet, the Service Accounts section doesn't appear on that contact — adding a bill for the account is what creates it.

Trustworthy creates Service Accounts from your bills. Add a bill or statement that shows the provider and an account number — either to your Inbox, or to a page you already have, such as your home in Property.

Trustworthy reads it and suggests the account along with the company it's with. Accept the suggestion, and both the Provider and the Service Account listed with that provider are created inside your Contacts category.

Where you accept it depends on where you added the bill:

• From your Inbox — select Accept on the bill's row.

• From a page — open the bill, open its details, and click the green plus icon to the right of the provider's name.

[Image: GIF — adding a bill to a page you already have, such as a home in Property, then clicking the green plus to accept the suggested Provider]

[Image: GIF — the same from the Inbox: adding a bill to the Inbox, then selecting Accept on its row]

Service Accounts are named from what's on the document, like "Account #8213-44901-2 with Westside Water District". To give one a name that's easier for you to recognize:

1. Open the company in Contacts, then select the Service Account.

2. Hover and click the pencil next to its name.

3. Enter the name you want and save it.

The name you enter is kept — Trustworthy won't rename it later.

A document that created a Service Account is stored on that account rather than in the company's Files, so each account's paperwork stays with the account it belongs to. Open the Service Account to find it.

You can also move a file you already have onto a Service Account, to keep everything for that account in one place. On the Service Account, under Files, select + Add → Move existing file, then type to search across your account for the file by name.

Service Accounts appear in the contacts directory of your Family Brief, listed with the company they belong to. Each one shows the type of service, the account number, and who holds the account. They don't get a section of their own — they're part of the company's entry.

Service Accounts come from utility bills. Trustworthy reads bills for electricity, gas, water, sewer, trash, recycling, heating oil, propane, cable, satellite TV, internet, landline phone and cell service — including combined bills that cover more than one of these, like water and sewer together.

A bill from another kind of company — a lawyer, an accountant, a mechanic — doesn't create a Service Account. Add those to the company's contact, where they'll sit with its other files.

For more on working with Service Accounts and the records around them, see Move a File to a Service Account, The Family Brief: Everything Your Family Would Need to Know and Managing Contacts in Trustworthy.