KB017: Troubleshooting Overleaf Professional Access (SSO Entitlement)

Scope: Overleaf Professional Subscriptions Audience: BearHelp Tier 1 Support, Faculty, Graduate Students Last Updated: March 4, 2026

1. The Problem

A user (Faculty or Graduate Student) logs into Overleaf but is defaulted to the “Free” version instead of their entitled “Professional” (Pro) tier.

2. The Cause

The Overleaf upgrade process is entirely automated based on UCR Single Sign-On (SSO) affiliation. If a user is not seeing their Pro features, their existing Overleaf account is likely not properly linked to the UCR SSO backend to verify their entitlement attribute.

3. Troubleshooting Steps (For Tier 1 Support / Users)

Step 1: Force SSO Account Linking

Advise the user to perform the following steps to manually force the SSO link to verify their affiliation:

1. Log in to your existing Overleaf account.
2. Navigate to your Account Settings page: https://www.overleaf.com/user/settings
3. If your @ucr.edu email is already listed: Look for a message prompting you to “Log in and link your Overleaf account to your SSO identity.” Click it and follow the Duo authentication prompts.
4. If your @ucr.edu email is NOT listed: Add your official UCR email address to the account on this settings page, then confirm it by logging in via SSO and Duo.

Step 2: Escalation to Vendor (If Step 1 Fails)

If the user successfully links their account via SSO but is still locked out of the Professional tier, it indicates a deep entitlement mapping error on Overleaf’s backend system.

• ⚠️ Do not escalate to ITS Systems or Research Computing. UCR IT does not have manual override controls for individual Overleaf licenses.
• Action: Instruct the user to email support@overleaf.com directly.
• Message Template: “My UCR SSO link is active, but it is not triggering the Pro upgrade entitlement on my account.”
• The Overleaf Support Team will manually verify and map their account to the UCR institutional license.