The Operator role sits between Admin and User, giving someone day-to-day administrative access without control over your most sensitive settings.
What an Operator can do
Operators can run Budgetly day to day. They have full access to:
- Card management — issue, freeze, and manage cards for the company
- Categories and workflow setup — create and edit categories and transaction settings
- Integrations — connect and manage accounting integrations like Xero
- Reporting and exports — view and export company-wide data
- Day-to-day approvals — approve transaction-level requests
What stays Admin-only
Five higher-risk areas remain reserved for Admins. Operators have no access to:
- Company settings
- Billing settings
- Spend policies (creating or editing the rules)
- Bill approvers (choosing who approves bill payments)
- User management (adding, editing, or removing users)
Note: Operators can still submit and process day-to-day approvals — they just can’t change who the designated bill approvers are, or edit the spend policy rules themselves.
Permissions at a glance
| Capability area | Admin | Operator | User | Accountant |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Company settings | Full access | No access | No access | No access |
| Billing settings | Full access | No access | No access | No access |
| Spend policies (create/edit) | Full access | No access | No access | No access |
| Bill approvers (assign/edit) | Full access | No access | No access | No access |
| User management | Full access | No access | No access | No access |
| Card management | Full access | Full access | No access | No access |
| Category and workflow setup | Full access | Full access | No access | No access |
| Integrations | Full access | Full access | No access | No access |
| Reporting and exports | Full access | Full access | View only (own data) | Full access |
| Day-to-day approvals | Full access | Full access | Submit only | No access |
Note: The Accountant role is a read-only reconciliation role. See Understanding user roles and permissions for the full permission-by-permission comparison across all roles.
How to assign the Operator role
You assign the Operator role the same way as any other role, when adding a user or editing an existing one.
- Open Settings in the sidebar and select Users.
- Choose the user you want to update, then select Edit user.
- Open the Role tab.
- Pick Operator.
- Click Save.
Moving someone from Admin to Operator
If you have team members who only need to run day-to-day tasks, move them from Admin to Operator so business-critical settings stay locked down.
- Navigate to Settings in the sidebar, then choose Users.
- Open the Admin user you want to change and select Edit user.
- Switch to the Role tab.
- Change the role from Admin to Operator.
- Save your changes.
Tip: Keep Admin for the people who genuinely manage billing, company settings, spend policies, and bill approvers. Everyone else who helps run the platform can be an Operator.