An authorised user is a person the account holder has allowed to get into their storage unit, usually with access set up in that person's own name. The unit and the agreement stay with the account holder. An older word for the same idea is key holder: someone trusted with a key to the unit.
At Wigwam
Our terms call these people your "Agents", defined as "persons who you authorise, or who accompany you, to access the Unit". Clause 14 says: "Only You or Your Agents may access the Unit. You are responsible for and liable to Us and other users of the Facility for Your own actions and those of Your Agents." Clause 16 adds: "You should not leave a key with or permit access to the Unit to any person other than Your own Agent who is responsible to You and subject to Your control. If You do so, it is at Your own risk."
There are two ways to set someone up:
- share a digital key through smart entry: several of our location pages say you "can grant temporary unit access to a friend, family member or colleague" this way. Our Cheltenham, Lincoln, Tewkesbury and Warminster pages say the key can be "temporary or permanent"; at other sites, ask when you book whether a permanent key is possible, for example so a member of staff can have standing access;
- email us their details, and we'll add them to our system (this is how our Chipping Norton page describes it).
We may ask anyone at the site for proof of identity, and can refuse entry to someone who can't give it (clause 14), so an authorised user should carry proof of who they are. If they don't have a smartphone, ask us whether we can give them a fob.
To take someone off, for example when a member of staff leaves, email us or call 0800 2545585. When you set someone up, ask whether you can also switch their key off yourself.
What it doesn't make them
An authorised user can get in. They don't become the account holder: billing, the deposit and notice to leave stay with you, and so does responsibility for what they do there. Anyone who simply comes with you is covered by being with you and needs nothing set up. Give each person access of their own, rather than lending your phone or code, so any access log shows whose access was used, and so you can remove one person without changing your own.
If the account holder dies. Access someone shared with you was given on the customer's behalf ("persons who you authorise", in our terms), and that kind of permission generally ends when the person who gave it dies. So don't use a shared key after a death: ring us on 0800 2545585 first and we'll tell you what we need. If the unit was in joint names, the surviving customer is still a customer under the agreement and should call us too. See executor.
Related terms: Smart entry · Access log · Access PIN · Sublet
Related questions: Can I share access to my storage unit with a family member or colleague? · Can anyone else access my unit?