Two (or more) patrons in different households with same PRIMARY email

If the example is two (or more) patrons in different households that have the same primary email address, it is indicated with the red square in the image above. They will have a red '-' icon at the beginning of the line. Suggested course of action when this condition occurs is to do one of:

• If a colour coded group of patrons are really the same person or should be in the same household, merge them
• if the patrons are very different people, then edit one of the patrons and remove the email address from their contact record. If the patron is limited profile, then you will need to do it from the contact tab on the patron record if you need to avoid providing all data for a full patron.

 

A single patron household with the same email address twice

 

If the list shows a Caution icon at the beginning of the row, the most likely cause is a single patron (or household) with the same email address twice in their contact record.

 

The first course of action for these patrons is to:

• edit their contact information in the contact card
• Use the Add button to add an existing email to a patron. Only continue if you see the duplicate email in the popup list under add email address.
• Once the duplicate email has been added to their account:
  • Change that email address to be obviously different. eg, if the email you just added was 'doug@abc.com', edit it to be 'xxxdoug@abc.com' - something visually and obviously different.
  • The patron will now have both 'doug@abc.com' and 'xxxdoug@abc.com' on their patron contact card.
  • note: This is the only time you will type over top of an existing email address to as you try to fix the problem.
• remove the email 'xxxdoug@abc.com' from the patron's contact card.
• If there are other patrons in the household
  • look at the emails on their account and remove any that now say 'xxxdoug@abc.com'.
  • If you do remove the one called 'xxxdoug@abc.com' from that patron, then use add and select the one from the list that says 'doug@abc.com' using the add button.
  • Note: The reason to do this is because the patron previously had the old (duplicated) copy of the email address that is no longer desired.
• If the above:
  • worked perfectly, then run the duplicate search by email again to see if the duplicate email still exists.
  • did not work, then try:
    • looking at other household members to see if they have the duplicate email address -or-
    • Looking to see if another patron has the same secondary email address as this patron, especially if the patron you are looking at has two email addresses
    • contact support and we will help you find it.

If you do not see duplicated email addresses in the patron contact window look at all emails addressess associated with the household and follow the procedure below to make both emails visible.

 

Multiple Patrons with the same SECONDARY email address

 

Examples of: If the list shows a Caution icon at the beginning of the row, a second probable cause cause is multiple patrons with the same SECONDARY email address twice in their contact record.

They patrons will have more than one email address associated with their record and the duplicated one is the non-primary.

 

If the cause of the duplicate is non-obvious, the course of action for these patrons is to do one of he following:

Option 1: show secondary address

If you also include the column 'All Email Addresses' in the list (see image below), you may be able to see who has duplicate secondary addresses with other patrons.

• Hint: use * to find a name within the list, then '+' to see the next match.
• then follow the some of the suggestions below for merging patrons or remove an email address from the patron it doesn't belong to.

Option 2: Search by email address from duplicate list

1. Copy the secondary email address in the account to the clipboard
2. Click the patron button on the toolbar
3. Change the search to be by Phone/Email/Web
4. Paste in the email address from step 1 and click search.
5. If this yields two or more patrons, the solution can be one of the following:
   • Merge people with somewhat similar names and emails into same patron -OR-
   • Merge people with similar last names or a known relationship to each other into same household -OR-
   • If the patrons have no known relationship to each other, then remove the email from one of the patrons - the one who is most likely not to own it. If it is unclear who might own the email adddress, contact the patrons to get clarification.

You may have to do some analysis and contact patrons to find out who should rightfully have the email address, or to find out if patrons are the same or related before choosing an action.