How To Troubleshoot Sign-In Problems?

The inability for officials or contacts to sign into the system will generally be caused by 4 different possible errors.  Ask the user what error message is displayed (this will be shown in red) as they attempt to sign-in and then use the solutions below to help them.

Solutions
1.  The email address the user is entering to sign-in is different from the email address you have entered for them in the system.  Ask the user to verify the email address with you and make sure you have entered it the same way.  If the email address is incorrect in the system you can either correct the email address yourself or ask the user to sign-in using the incorrect address and then have them correct the address once they’ve logged on successfully.

2.  The password the user has entered does not match the password required.  When the user gets this message a link will be displayed for them to click if they’ve forgotten their password.  Clicking this link will give the user the opportunity to have the password emailed to them.  Passwords are case-sensitive, so be attentive to the upper/lower case letters.  Because the initial password is always the user’s last name, those officials with a Jr., Sr., III, etc. will have to enter the entire last name text as their password.  IE- ‘peterson jr.’

3.  The user is entering a valid email address and password, but the assignor has not given the user permission to sign-in.  From the Assignor’s Start Page click on Set Permissions and move the user from the left-hand side to the right-hand side for the ‘allow users to: sign in the system’ permission.

4.  The user’s browser settings aren’t allowing them to sign-in because they can’t accept cookies.  The user can correct this by changing their settings in Internet Explorer.  This is done by clicking on the TOOLS pull-down and then on INTERNET OPTIONS.  There are two methods for allowing thearbiter.net’s cookies. We suggest using option 1 because it will only allow cookies from the Arbiter, not all websites. 1) Click on the SECURITY tab and then on the TRUSTED SITES icon.  Click the SITES button and then type https://www.thearbiter.net into the blank, and then click ADD. 2) Click on the PRIVACY tab and then on the ADVANCED button.  Check the box for OVERRIDE AUTOMATIC COOKIE HANDLING and then on ALWAYS ALLOW SESSION COOKIES.  Method one is recommended because it limits the browser to only accept cookies from thearbiter.net, but either method is effective.