Collaboration on boards and workspace

[Dave Rike]

I have 3 members and a workspace with 5 boards.  How can all 3 members collaborate on 2 of those boards on the free version?  I was able to add everyone to one board but as soon as I try to add them both to a 2nd board it says it will then charge us for the account.

Structure is like this:

CEO - Manager 1 - Manager 2 =  3 Members

Customer Service Board = all 3 members

Accounting Board = all 3 members

3 other boards = CEO only

[arbaev · Accepted solution]

Hi!

With only 3 people, you're well within the free plan limit (up to 10 collaborators per workspace), so you should absolutely be able to do this without paying.

The key is how you add people. Make sure your managers are added as Workspace members, not as board guests:

1. Go to your Workspace settings (click your workspace name in the left sidebar)
2. Click Members
3. Invite both managers as Workspace members there

Once they're Workspace members, you can add them to any number of boards within that workspace — each person counts as one collaborator regardless of how many boards they're
on.

If you added them directly to a board via the "Share" button instead, they might have been added as board guests, which can sometimes trigger confusing upgrade prompts.

Your setup (3 members, 5 boards, 2 shared) is 100% supported on the free plan.

If you're still seeing the charge message after adding them as Workspace members, check your collaborator count in Workspace settings — there might be old pending invitations
or deactivated guests from before that are inflating the number.

Hope this helps!

[Dave Rike]

If I do that this is the message I receive.

1 new member license

- You will be charged $0.00 now

- Your monthly bill will increase by $12.50 on 2/26

I just set it up but the trial is still active for Premium which I won't likely use.  The other members are guests now so I see what you mean by that but I don't understand why it won't let me invite them to the workspace without the added charge.  Any ideas?

[Dave Rike]

"Adding people to your Premium Workspace will update your billing automatically. "

This is the message I get if I try to add them to the workspace where I see them as guests

Help?  :)

[arbaev]

Here's the issue — your Premium trial is still active, and while it's running, Trello treats your workspace as a paid Premium workspace. That means every member you add triggers a billing charge ($12.50/month per member).

You have two options:

1. Wait for the trial to end. If you haven't added a payment method, the trial will expire after 14 days and your workspace will automatically downgrade to the Free plan. After that, you can add all 3 members to any boards — no charge (Free plan supports up to 10 collaborators). 
2. Cancel the trial early. Unfortunately, you can't do this from the UI, via support only: https://support.atlassian.com/trello/docs/change-or-cancel-your-trello-plan/

Important: Make sure you do NOT have a payment method attached to the workspace, otherwise it will auto-convert to a paid Premium plan when the trial ends instead of downgrading to Free.

More details: https://support.atlassian.com/trello/docs/how-billing-works-with-trello-premium-and-standard/

[Dave Rike]

Got it. Thank you so much. I thought that may be triggering it but wasn’t sure. Really appreciate the help.