SPA: Direct Membership vs. Delegated Access

A knowledge base article about SPA: Direct Membership vs. Delegated Access provided by the UC Berkeley IT Service Hub - Knowledge Portal

What are the differences between Direct Members and Users with Delegated Access?

Direct Members

Are active campus employees, affiliates or students
Have administrative access to their CalNet SPAs, including:
- Adding or removing other Direct Members in CalGroups (employees only)
- Giving access to SPA-affiliated bMail accounts via Delegated Access
- Logging directly into the affiliated bMail account to send emails from the SPA
- Creating a bConnected key to access the affiliated bMail account from a mobile device (email bconnected@berkeley.edu for assistance).
Each CalNet SPA can have any number of Direct Members
Your users or service providers may be emailing important information to the SPA email account. Ensure that you are seeing these emails by
- Forwarding SPA emails to the correct members or 3rd party users
- Delegating access to the SPA email account and checking the email regularly
The Department, not a user, owns a SPA

Delegated Access

Users with Delegated Access have limited access rights to the SPA. They:
- Can access the bMail account affiliated with the SPA via their own bMail account
- Can send email from the SPA-affiliated bMail account
- Cannot manage membership in CalGroups
- Cannot delegate access to others
The bMail account is owned by the department, not the user

SPA Roles and Access

Roles	Access	View	Services	Set up using SPA Admin tool	Purposes
Direct Member	Full access and control of the associated bConnected account.	Can see all bConnected properties.	All services that accept a CalNet ID can potentially accept a SPA CalNet ID for authentication.	Yes, to create SPAs and manage membership, use the Special Purpose Accounts Admin App.	Can allow a CalNet ID to have multiple users that can share this SPA CalNet ID with others in their department for authentication purposes. Can anonymously send emails directly from the SPA-affiliated bMail account.
Delegated access role in bConnected	Limited Access to account. Cannot log in directly to the account and cannot give any access to others.	Has the ability to view the email account only within their personal bMail account from the pull down menu on the upper right hand side only.	bConnected via their personal bMail only.	No.	Can read and send emails from this account. Emails sent via delegated access show sender "SPA@berkeley.edu (sent by user@berkeley.edu).

For calendar sharing options, please contact bconnected@berkeley.edu. It is not possible to share a Calendar with a Delegated Access role.

Contact Us

To create SPAs and manage membership, use the Special Purpose Accounts Admin App. SPAs are intended for collaboration and sharing. SPAs, their contents/data, and the shared email account are owned by the institution and the primary department (at the time the SPA is created) of the employee who creates the SPA.

If you have any questions regarding SPA CalNet IDs, contact itcsshelp@berkeley.edu.