Account Setup

Account Setup

This guide walks you through creating your SIPSTACK account and getting your organization ready to use. It links into the detailed Switchboard documentation at each step rather than repeating it — follow the links when you want the full field-by-field walkthrough.

Step 1 — Sign Up

Create a self-serve account at switchboard.sipstack.com/signup. Signup is a six-step wizard that creates your organization, makes you its owner, and — on a trial-eligible plan — starts a 14-day free trial:

1. Account — name, work email, company name, password
2. Company details — country (sets your billing currency and pricing region), industry, company size
3. Choose your Flare plan — the SMS tier to start on, or pick “I don’t need SMS” if you only want the phone system. Declining SMS means no Flare plan is created and nothing Flare is charged
4. Nova phone system — bundle a Nova PBX Pro trial on the same 14 days. This step is optional when you have a Flare plan, and required when you declined SMS (Nova is then your plan). Either way you pick your PBX address — the permanent identifier behind your SIP domain (<address>.nova.sipstack.com), pre-filled from your company name and availability-checked as you type
5. Payment — a card is always required. On a trial-eligible plan (Flare Pro, Nova Pro) $0 is charged today and billing starts on day 14 unless you cancel. Core and Ultra are direct-purchase tiers — those start and are charged as soon as you complete signup, and the signup screen says so before you enter a card
6. Invite your team (optional) — up to five teammates as Admin or Billing users

The full walkthrough — password rules, email verification codes, promo codes, and signup troubleshooting — is on Creating Your Account.

Tip

Use a real, permanent business email address. Disposable addresses are rejected, and your email is used for account recovery, billing notices, and compliance communications.

Note

Invited to an existing organization instead? You don’t sign up — use the activation link from your invitation email. See Email Verification & Activation.

Step 2 — First Login & the Setup Checklist

After signup you are signed in immediately and land on your dashboard. Switchboard tracks your remaining setup in the Finish setup checklist — open the organization switcher (your company name, top-left) and click Finish setup to see what’s left:

Steps are grouped by product — you only see steps for products you are subscribed to or trialing — plus an Account group for work that belongs to the organization rather than to any one product. Every step’s state is read live from your account, so nothing is ticked off by a stored flag: remove the underlying thing and the step comes back.

Two steps only appear in certain accounts:

Step	When you see it
Add a payment method (Account)	When your organization is billed by card. It takes you to Account → Billing to add a card so service keeps running when your trial ends. Organizations billed another way don’t see it at all.
Add your office location (Nova PBX)	While the 911 location requirement is on for your phone system. It sits ahead of Create an extension, because an extension cannot be saved until the address it dials 911 from — and someone to notify — exists.

While your Nova steps are incomplete, that group also offers a Set up team shortcut — see Set Up Your Team, which creates extensions, sign-in accounts, and app access for your whole roster in one pass.

The same menu is how you reach every account-level page: Account (settings), Billing, Subscriptions, Phone Numbers, Permission Groups, Users, Compliance, and Audit Log.

Step 3 — Review Your Organization Settings

Open Account → Account to verify your organization profile:

• Organization name — appears throughout Switchboard; see Account Settings for how name changes work
• Addresses & emergency address — required before placing calls; E911 depends on it
• Security — enable Two-Factor Authentication for your login

Step 4 — Review Your Plan & Trial

Your trial subscriptions appear on Account → Subscriptions with their end dates. From there you can:

• Change tiers or cancel before day 14 to avoid any charge — see Managing Subscriptions
• Add another product via Add product → Explore — see Exploring & Upgrading Plans

Product	What it’s for
Nova PBX	Hosted cloud phone system — extensions, call routing, voicemail, devices
Flare SMS	A2P SMS campaigns, two-way messaging, contacts, automation
Aura AI	AI voice agents, Voice Studio TTS & cloning — included with paid Nova/Flare plans

On day 14 your card is charged for the plan(s) you kept and the subscription becomes active.

Step 5 — Invite Your Team

If you skipped invites during signup, add teammates from Account → Users: each user gets an email with a link to set their password, and you assign them seats on your subscriptions plus a permission group that controls what they can do. See Managing Users.

What to Do Next

1. Quick Start Guide — add your first extension, buy a number, and route a call
2. Navigating Switchboard — understand the portal layout
3. Buy a Phone Number — or port your existing numbers in
4. Set up 10DLC — required before sending A2P SMS to US/Canadian numbers