Set up your CertCentral account
New to CertCentral or just need a quick refresher? This guide covers some basic account set up and configuration topics to help you get more from your CertCentral account. Take some time now to set up your account so you can worry less about SSL certificates and spend more time doing the things you want.
Manage your profile
Verify and update your personal information on the Profile Settings page. In the upper right corner of your account, in the “your name” dropdown, select My Profile.
On the Profile Settings page, manage your:
Personal information (phone, job title, etc.)
Account information (email, username, password, and security question)
Account language preference
API keys (for API documentation, see our Developers portal)
Payment options
CertCentral provides you with two payment methods by default: credit card and account balance.
Credit Card
You can always pay with credit card when ordering a certificate. You can use a credit card for a one-time payment or save a credit card to your account for future uses.
Notice
Currently, when a credit card is used to purchase a certificate, you can't automatically renew that certificate. Pay with account balance to automatically renew certificates.
Currently, credit cards are only available on a per user basis. Credit card information isn't shared with other users in your CertCentral account.
Account balance
Deposit funds directly into your CertCentral account to debit your certificate purchases against your balance. In the sidebar menu, click Finances > Settings and enable the Bill to account balance payment method. Then, make deposits into your CertCentral account.
Notice
When using account balance to purchase a certificate, you can set the certificate to be automatically renewed.
CertCentral provides two methods for depositing funds in your account:
Credit card
To make a deposit with a credit card, visit the Deposit Funds page (in the sidebar menu, click Finances > Deposit Funds).
Purchase order
To make a deposit with a PO, visit the Purchase Orders page (in the sidebar menu, click Finances > Purchase Order).
When submitting POs, DigiCert sends you an invoice. Funds are only made available in your account when you make payment towards the invoice.
Account-wide notifications
The email address used to create your CertCentral account (the original administrator only) is automatically sent copies of all account emails, including renewal notifications.
To designate additional email address to receive copies of all email notifications sent from your CertCentral account, go to the Notifications page (in the sidebar menu, click Settings > Notifications). Creating a dedicated email address or distribution list for this purpose allows you to keep track of all activity on your account.
Renewal notifications
To ensure you don’t forget about any upcoming certificate expirations, CertCentral sends certificate renewal notifications to all account administrators and the user who requested the certificate. These renewal notifications are sent to these same email addresses at every stage as certificates approach expiration.
By default, CertCentral sends certificate renewal notices at these intervals:
90, 60, 30, 7, and 3 days before expiration
7 days after expiration
To customize your account renewal notifications, visit Certificate Renewal Settings (in the sidebar menu, click Settings > Preferences, where you can:
Choose when renewal notifications are sent.
Add additional email addresses to receive renewal notifications.
Configure escalation renewal notifications to alert specific email addresses at each interval. See Configure Escalation Renewal Notifications.
Notice
Email addresses included in your account-wide notifications receive renewal notifications (see Account-wide notifications). You don't need to add those addresses here too.
DigiCert recommends keeping renewal notifications enabled at the account level to avoid unintended certificate expiration that can cause site downtime.
Order specific renewal notifications
After configuring your account renewal notifications, you can turn off renewal notifications for individual certificate orders. Visit the certificate's Order # details page. In the Order details section, disable renewal notifications for the order. You can re-enable renewal notifications for an order by returning to the certificate's Order # details and clicking Enable.
Account sign in security settings
DigiCert requires all CertCentral accounts to use two-factor authentication: something you know and something you have. By default, you must use your credentials (something you know) and a one-time password (something you have) to access your CertCentral account.
To require a different two-factor authentication method for users in your account, or to configure other sign in requirements such as password complexity, use the the Authentication Settings page (in the sidebar menu, click Settings > Authentication Settings).
Depending on company policy or personal preferences, you may want to set your own password requirements (length, categories, and expiration) and other account sign in settings.
Audit logs
Audit logs are a history of actions that occur in your account. CertCentral automatically keeps audit logs that record more than 50 different actions in your account (including sign ins, certificate requests, and revocations), along with the time stamp and user who performed the action. To see the audit logs in your account, visit the Audit Logs page (in the sidebar menu, click Account > Audit Logs).
Add users to help manage account and certificates
Adding users to your CertCentral account allows members of your organization to place their own certificate orders, manage certificates, account finances, etc.
Each user is assigned a role allowing you to control what they see and the actions they can take in your account. For example, the Finance Manager role can access and change account billing details and create purchase orders but can't add an email address to receive account-wide notifications.
To add additional users, visit the Users page (in the sidebar menu, click Account > Users). On the Add User page click Add User. For more information about user roles, adding a user, inviting a user, etc., see Manage users.
Note
After you add a user, they'll receive an email with instructions for setting up their password.
What's next
To learn more about account configurations and customization, browse through the topics in our Manage account section.