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Question

Transferring Ownership for Projects and Files (after some has left the company)

  • March 16, 2022
  • 10 replies
  • 3588 views

AnnaKayKay

Hello,

We have an organization plan. Someone who left the company has transferred the organization ownership for me. But he didn’t transfer all the projects and files, can this be done afterwards? (Our company licence support asked me to contact Figma support.)

Looking forward to your answer.

This topic has been closed for replies.

10 replies

Christina12
  • New Member
  • April 19, 2022

I have the same issue!
@AnnaKayKay: have you already found a solution?

Thank you!
Kind regards,
Christina


JDS
  • June 15, 2022

We also have this problem. We had a scenario where an org guest was owner of some files and we had no way to take ownership. There also doesn’t seem to be any way to claim ownership of a file.


Stefan_Schroter

Hi, we also have the same issue here. Any solutions yet?


Monika_Visnova

Same issue in our company.


Steve_Ingels

Is there an update on this? We’re having the same issue with an employee that has left.


Beth_Mourino_Thurnher

Same issue… anyone have a solution?


Karttunen_Juha

Solution: File ownership does not really matter - it is a temporary construct so that the file creator can add editors. It should probably be renamed to ‘file creator’ or something. The solution is to be the project owner, which allows you to do anything that the file creator can do.

To reclaim project ownership, you can delete the owner account, then join to team & project to claim ownership.

NOTE that this creates a GDPR / privacy issue of publishing the draft files of deleted account to all Figma Admins, also via search.


Shuyu_Yang
  • February 5, 2024

Any update for this issue


y_toku
Figmate
  • Community Support
  • February 6, 2024

Thanks for the feedback. Currently,

  • Only the current owner can transfer ownership of a project.
  • Owners can only transfer ownership to someone who is an existing collaborator on that project.

When the owner is no longer with an account, please reach out to our support team https://help.figma.com/hc/en-us/requests/new.

I know it’s the best solution for you, but the account safety is also important.

Thanks for your understanding.
Toku


  • May 8, 2024

I know you are just doing your job, Figma. But if I am choosing design software for my team and 2 is getting in the way of completing client work (aka the only reason I need your software), then I would really consider going elsewhere. It’s a problem over and over these days. Security is important, sure. But if you are so secure that now my clients are suffering because I can’t access a file due to a very usual issue such as the ones described above, then I think you need to do better.

It’s stressful enough when a team member leaves for any reason. You should be looking for ways to make this less stressful as an organization and consider your customer caring that an ex-employee may actually be the security risk.

Rant over.