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How to consolidate two contact records - Consolidating contacts

Sometimes a second or duplicate record is inadvertently created for the same customer, for example Susan Brown and Sue Brown. How do you consolidate these two records? This procedure may only be done in level4.

Decide which of the two records you wish to keep. It is probably the first one created because it will no doubt have more work orders and invoices attached to it. You want to be sure to retain all of their invoices and work orders in their customer history.

DO NOT PROCEED WITH THIS UNLESS YOU HAVE MADE A BACK UP.

1. Log in under level4.

2. Do a Find for the customer.
E.g. Type in the first two letters of the first and last name. For Susan Brown, su and br. Or type in her address only. Click Perform Find.

3. Write down the ID# of the records in question.

4. Decide which one of the records you are going to keep.

5. Navigate to the Work Order file.

6. Click Find button.

7. Enter the errant ID# in the ID# field. Click the Perform Find button.
If more than one record is found then a list appears.

8. If the List View is presented, then click Form View button.

9. Highlight the ID# field and type in the correct number. Make sure that the cursor is still flashing in the field.

10. Go to Records menu at the top.

11. Select Replace Field Contents, near the bottom of the list.

12. Confirm that it says "Permanently replace the contents of the field "Customer Number" in the ....the number of records matches your found set".
If not, do not proceed, click Cancel.

13. Click Replace button.
This will enter the same ID# into all the work orders in your found set. You will now notice that the correct name is entered on each work order.

14. Repeat steps 6-8 in the Invoice file.
Call Tech Support if you discover you have Invoices that need to be consolidated.

15. Return to the Contacts file.

16. Find the errant customer record using the Find button.

17. Click the Work Orders and Invoices tabs to make sure there are no records present.
It is now OK to delete this customer record.

18. Click the grey Delete Contact side bar button, bottom left side.
This is a permanent procedure. Once the record has been deleted it CANNOT be retrieved.

Coach your staff to be thorough in their search before creating a new customer record in order to prevent this type of customer record duplication from happening alot. The narrower the information typed in, the broader the search. The net will pull in a larger group of records to determine whether or not this customer has already been in your shop. You can also go to the Contacts file and instead of typing in the full name of a client, perhaps only look for the address instead, or use the first few letters of the name or the last name only, or perhaps the phone number.