Duplicate contacts can occur in OnlineFundraising. If you identify duplicates, you can easily find and merge them to retain the correct contact details while keeping all transactional data.
1. Find the contact to keep (target)
Begin by locating the contact in OnlineFundraising. Navigate to Transactional > Contacts and search for the contact using either their phone number, email address, national ID, business code og external ID (such as a reference from your CRM system). If duplicates exist, you'll see two or more results in the search.
Choose the contact to keep based on the following criteria:
- Creation date: Contacts are sorted by most recently created first
- Contact information: Select the contact with the most complete information.
When integrating with external systems, it is often beneficial to retain the oldest contact to maintain lifetime value or similar records.
Please note: You will have the option to select specific contact details to keep during the merging process. See step 3 for details.
The image exemplifies a contact search using phone number with multiple results.
2. Select the contact to merge (source)
2.1. Select Merge
In the contact window, select the Merge action.
2.2. Search for the contact to merge
After selecting Merge, search for the duplicate contact you wish to merge with. You can do this in two ways:
- (Recommended) Click the arrow next to email or phone number. This will automatically populate the search field with matching contact details.
- Alternatively, manually enter the email address or phone number in the search field.
2.3. Select the contact from the search results
The search results will display one or more contacts with matching details. From this list, select the duplicate contact you want to merge with.
3. Select contact details and review the result
Once you have selected the duplicate contact, a window will appear allowing you to choose the contact details to keep and review the outcome.
3.1. Choose contact details
The source (the contact to merge) and target (the contact to keep) are displayed side by side. Select the desired details from each contact. By default, the target's data is preselected.
3.2. Review the result
The resulting contact information is summarised in the right-hand column. Carefully review the data before completing the merge.
Important: If a field is empty for both on both contacts, it will be excluded from the summary. For instance, if both contacts lack an address, the address field will not appear in the review.
4. Merge the contacts
Click Merge to complete the process. The window will close, and you will return to the updated contact in the system.
The retained contact now includes:
- Selected contact details (if any changes were made)
- Payments, Subscriptions and Payment methods, regardless of their original status
- An updated change log documenting the merge
The duplicate contact will be archived. To access it, go to the associated change log and follow the link to the archived contact.
It is possible to navigate back to the active contact by clicking View merged on the archived contact.
5. Undo a merge
It is possible to undo a merge if needed. Navigate to the archived contact and select Unmerge. This action restores the archived contact and resets the data on both contacts to their previous states.