First steps after installing

This article lists what to set up, in order, after the installer finishes. Each step links to the article that covers it in detail.

What the installer already did#

The installer asks for a Business name, a Default currency, your administrator account (name, email, password) and, if any plugins are available, which ones to switch on. It saves the business name, the currency and your email as the business contact email, and it turns on client self-registration. Everything else on this page is still to do.

Checklist#

1. Fill in your business details. Open Settings → General and add your address, tax or VAT number, brand colour and logo. These print on invoices, quotes and emails. See Company details and brand.
2. Check billing defaults. Under Settings → Billing, review the store currency, invoice prefix, payment terms and the reminder and suspension schedule. The defaults work for many businesses. See Settings reference.
3. Set up email. Under Settings → Email, enter your sender address and SMTP details, save, then press Send test email. Invoices, receipts and reminders all depend on this. See Email.
4. Add tax rates, if you charge tax. Until you add one, invoices are issued without tax. See Taxes and currencies.
5. Turn on a payment gateway. Enable Stripe or PayPal under Plugins, then fill in its keys under Settings → Payments. Without a gateway you can still record bank transfers by hand on each invoice. See Payment gateways.
6. Create products. Add a group or two, then your products with prices. See Products and groups.
7. Connect a server, if a product creates accounts on a control panel. See Servers.
8. Make sure the cron job runs. Renewal invoices, reminders and suspensions happen from the scheduled task. Settings → System shows the exact command and has a Run billing tasks now button for a one-off check. See Cron job.
9. Add your team. Staff accounts live under Staff in the admin menu. See Staff and access.
10. Place a test order. Open /store while signed out, order something, and pay the invoice. See The order form.

Test with a gateway in test mode first. Stripe test keys start with sk_test_, and PayPal has a Sandbox mode. Switch to live credentials only when the test order works from start to finish.

Optional features#

Support tickets and the knowledge base are off until you enable them under Settings → Support and Settings → Knowledge base. Two-factor sign-in for staff can be made mandatory under Settings → Security.

Related#

• Company details and brand
• Payment gateways
• Settings reference