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Question

Unable to add managed users - "You do not have permissions to add new users" error on primary Admin account

  • April 3, 2026
  • 1 reply
  • 6 views
O

I am the primary Admin on a Box Business account and I am receiving the error "You do not have permissions to add a new users, contact your administrator for assistance" when trying to add managed users through the Admin Console.

 

I have verified that my account role is set to Admin (not Co-Admin) and the account status is Active, so the permissions appear to be correctly configured. The error occurs on the second Save attempt after the expected "1 user failed to be added" warning (due to the users having existing personal Box accounts).

 

Could someone from Box please help investigate why the primary Admin account is unable to add managed users?

      1 reply

      Jey Bueno Box
      • Jey Bueno Box
      • Community Manager
      • April 3, 2026

      👋 Hi ​@oc_icon, welcome to the Box Community, and thanks for bringing this to our attention.


      Can you confirm whether the users you’re trying to add are on Free Individual accounts or paid personal accounts? If they’re on Free Individual accounts, please try the steps below (if you haven’t done so yet) and see whether the issue improves. You may also want to try this in an incognito or private browser window:

      1. In the Admin Console, go to Users and Groups.
      2. Click Add User.
      3. Select Add User Manually.
      4. Enter the user’s name and email address.
      5. Click Save.
      6. You should see a red banner error and a yellow marker next to the user, indicating they are an external user.
      7. Click Save again.

      This will send the user an invitation email to join the enterprise. They’ll need to open the email, accept the invitation, and complete the join process.


      If you still run into an error, please submit a support ticket to Product Support using your admin email. Be sure to include the email addresses of the affected users so the team can review their status and help troubleshoot further.


      Thank you for your patience. We look forward to helping you get this resolved.

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