> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.instaforge.app/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Self sign-up for new agencies > Let agencies create their own account from the website, confirm their email and start a free trial on the plan you choose. New agencies can create an account on their own instead of waiting for you to [add them](/running-the-agency/agencies). They fill in a short form, confirm their email and start a free trial on the plan you pick. When the trial ends, [your plans and billing](/running-the-agency/plans) take over as for any other agency. Self sign-up is off until you turn it on. While it's off, the sign-up page says it's closed, the website shows no trial button and nobody can create an account. ## Turn it on New agencies start on one of your [plans](/running-the-agency/plans). Make sure it's **Offered to new agencies**. To ask for a card before the trial starts, the plan must have a price and your Stripe or WayForPay account must be connected. On the **Platform** page, find **Sign-up**, under the plans. The badge next to the title says **Open** or **Closed**. Pick the **Plan for new agencies**, switch on **New agencies can sign up** and click **Save**. If something is missing, the section lists what to fix and sign-up stays closed. See [Troubleshooting](#troubleshooting). The section shows the address of the **Sign-up page**, with a button to copy it. The same page opens from **Start a free trial** on the sign-in page and on the website. ## The settings | Setting | What it does | | - | - | | New agencies can sign up | The main switch. Off by default | | Plan for new agencies | The plan every new agency starts on. Only plans offered to new agencies can be chosen. It sets the assistant limit, the features and the included AI | | Free trial (days) | Days of free use. Leave it empty to use the plan's own trial. 0 asks for payment straight away | | Ask for a card before the trial starts | The agency stays locked to its plan page until it adds a card. Needs a paid plan and payments connected | | New agencies a day | How many new agencies can sign up in one day across the whole platform. 20 by default | | Blocked email domains | Email domains that can't sign up, for example `example-agency.test`. Their subdomains are blocked too | The section also shows how many sign-ups are **waiting for email confirmation** and how many signed up in the last 24 hours. The plan chosen for sign-up can't be deleted. Pick another plan here first. ## What visitors see 1. **Start free trial** appears on the website in all four languages while sign-up is open: at the top of the page, in the header and the phone menu, under the use cases, in the contact section and in the footer. The demo request and the contact form stay as they are. 2. The sign-up page shows the plan's name, price, assistant limit and trial, and whether a card is needed. The visitor types their name, the agency's name, their email and a password, and accepts the terms of service and the privacy policy. See [Sign up for an agency account](/getting-started/sign-up). 3. They get an email with a link that works for 48 hours. Until they open it, the account can't be used. 4. Opening the link turns the agency on with the plan's limits and starts the trial. The person lands in the dashboard as the agency's admin, with the [in-app guide](/getting-started/in-app-guide) ready. After you switch sign-up on or off, the website can take about 5 minutes to show or hide the trial button. The sign-up page changes at once, and the link on the sign-in page within 30 seconds. ## Protection against abuse There's no captcha. These limits apply instead: | Limit | What happens | | - | - | | 3 sign-ups an hour and 10 a day from one internet address | Further tries get "Too many attempts". An IPv6 network (/64) counts as one address | | 3 sign-ups a day from one company email domain | Large public mailbox providers, such as gmail.com, are not limited by domain. They still count towards the address limits and the daily limit | | New agencies a day | Your own limit for the whole platform. Once it's reached, sign-up waits until the next day (UTC) | | A hidden field and a minimum of 3 seconds on the form | Robots that fill in the hidden field or send the form too fast get a normal-looking answer, and nothing is created | | Throwaway email services | A list of well-known throwaway mail services comes with InstaForge and is never downloaded from outside. Your own blocked domains are added to it | Demo addresses such as `example.test` and `example.com` are never blocked, so you can try sign-up yourself. The sign-up form never says whether an email already has an account. Someone signing up with an email in use gets an email saying they already have an account, with links to sign in and to reset the password, at most once an hour. Signing up again with an email still waiting for confirmation replaces the earlier form and sends a fresh link. That link then also asks for the password of the newest form, so someone who sent the form first with another person's email can't keep a password to that account. ## Alerts and badges You get an alert each time a new agency confirms its email, with the agency's name, the plan and the admin's name and email. Sign-ups that never confirm don't send alerts. On the Platform page, agencies that signed up on their own have a **Signed up** badge and show when they signed up. Those still waiting for the email link show **Waiting for email** instead of the paused badge. ## Pause, resume and delete Pausing and resuming work as for [any other agency](/running-the-agency/agencies#pause-an-agency). An agency still waiting for its email can't be paused or resumed: it turns on only when its admin opens the link. Agencies that signed up on their own also have a **Delete** button. Type the agency's name exactly to confirm. The agency, its team, assistants, conversations and everything else in it are removed for good. * Agencies you created yourself can only be paused, not deleted. * An agency with a running subscription can't be deleted. Cancel the subscription first, or pause the agency. * If you had switched into that agency, your own account stays and you're moved back to all agencies. Sign-ups that are never confirmed are deleted on their own about two days after the form was sent, or after the last link sent to them expires if that is later. ## How billing takes over The trial starts when the person opens the email link, not when they send the form, so unconfirmed sign-ups never use up trial days. From then on the agency is on your plan like any other: * **No card asked for:** the agency works straight away. Its admins see the trial on **Settings → Plan** and can subscribe at any time. * **Card asked for:** the agency is locked to its plan page, which says **Add a card to start your free trial** and when the trial ends. Its assistants stay silent, and only its admins can sign in. Once the admin subscribes, everything turns on by itself. With Stripe, the first charge comes when the trial ends. With WayForPay, the first period is charged at once and the trial days are added to it. * **When the trial ends** without a subscription, the usual steps follow: the payment page, the grace days, then a pause if **Pause agencies that don't pay** is on. See [When an agency doesn't pay](/running-the-agency/plans#when-an-agency-doesnt-pay). The trial clock runs while an agency waits to add a card. ## Troubleshooting When something stops sign-up from working, the Sign-up section shows **Sign-up is closed until this is fixed** with the reason. Sign-up also closes on its own if one of these happens later, for example when the plan stops being offered. | Message | What to do | | - | - | | Email isn't set up on this server. | Sign-up needs email to send the confirmation links. Set up outgoing email in the server's `.env` file (the `SMTP_` settings and `MAIL_FROM`) and restart it | | Choose a plan for new agencies. | Pick a plan in **Plan for new agencies** | | This plan isn't offered any more | Switch **Offered to new agencies** back on for the plan, or pick another plan | | Asking for a card needs payments connected. | Connect Stripe or WayForPay under **How agencies pay you**, or switch off **Ask for a card before the trial starts** | | Asking for a card needs a paid plan. | Pick a plan with a price, or switch off **Ask for a card before the trial starts** | You can always switch sign-up off or change the daily limit, even while something is listed. Their name, the agency's name, their email, a hash of the password, and when they accepted the terms of service and the privacy policy, with the version of those texts. The internet address is only used in the abuse counters, which expire within a day, and isn't kept with the account. The privacy policy describes this too. They can press **Send the link again** on the screen after the form or on the sign-in page, or **Send a new link** on the page an expired link opens. Each new link replaces the older one. Ask them to look in the spam folder too. Yes. Connected as the platform owner, an [AI agent](/running-the-agency/ai-agents) can read the settings and what blocks them with `signup_settings`, change them with `set_signup`, and see which agencies signed up on their own in `list_agencies`. `delete_agency` deletes a signed-up agency after the exact name is confirmed, and only when you ask. This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.