Connect a conversation's customer to an existing profile

An operator handling a conversation recognises that its customer already has a profile — someone who wrote on WhatsApp now writes from a new Instagram profile — and connects the two from the Inbox, so the customer has one profile with all their conversations and channels.

When this happens: You click Same customer as… in the conversation's customer panel.

Step by step

1
Open the Instagram conversation of *Maria*, a new profile: she is Maria Popescu, who wrote on WhatsApp last month.
2
Click Same customer as… in the customer panel.
EasyCRM opens a dialog with one search box: Search by name, phone, email or handle.
3
Enter Popescu, or her phone number, email or a channel handle.
EasyCRM shows up to 10 of the company's customers who match, from two characters on, the most recently active first, never the conversation's own: each with the name, the phone and email masked (+373 69 ••• 456, m•••@example.com), the channels they are reachable on and the last interaction. Customers other operators serve are listed too, so a customer someone else served can be found; their email, phone and handles are found only by the whole value (the whole email, the whole number), their names by part, except a name made from a masked number, and they show less: the phone's country code and last two digits (+373 ••• 56), in a name made from the number too, and their channels without identifiers. A customer the operator may not connect — one owned by someone outside their own view, when they do not hold the *Merge Contacts* permission — shows Belongs to someone else — needs the Merge Contacts permission under it and cannot be picked.
4
Pick *Maria Popescu*.
EasyCRM shows the two profiles side by side, the picked one masked as in the results with its number of conversations, and the sentences The conversations and channels of Maria move to Maria Popescu. This can't be undone and Their opportunities, quotes, invoices and tickets move too. Maria Popescu's name, company, owner and stage are kept, unless Maria Popescu has none.
5
Click Connect.
EasyCRM moves the conversations, channel identities, follow-ups and other records of *Maria* to Maria Popescu, and archives *Maria*. Maria Popescu keeps her names, her company, her owner, her stage and every value she has; her blank details (email, phones, job title, department, country, description, LinkedIn, date of birth, language) are filled from *Maria*, and *Maria*'s street address only when Maria Popescu has none, so two addresses never mix; an opt-out of either of them (do not email, do not call, unsubscribed, spam report), or a consent *Maria* withdrew, applies to Maria Popescu; a bounced email only when Maria Popescu now has that address. EasyCRM records the merge on Maria Popescu as every merge is recorded, with the conversation it was made from; when the connection withdrew Maria Popescu's consent or set one of her opt-outs, her consent history records it as a withdrawal by hand is, naming the connection and the conversation. EasyCRM closes the dialog with Connected to Maria Popescu; the customer panel, and every open view of the conversation, now shows Maria Popescu.

Other paths

Back to the results

Click Back instead of Connect. Nothing changes: another customer can be picked, or the dialog closed.

Too short a search

If the search has fewer than two characters. EasyCRM shows Type at least two characters and lists no one.

The existing profile has no real name

Pick a profile named after a masked number, such as Phone +373 69 ••• 456: Maria first called without giving her name, and nobody serves that profile yet. She now writes on Instagram as Maria Popescu, from a florist's shop. EasyCRM moves the records of *Maria* to the existing profile as in the main flow, and that profile also takes the name Maria Popescu, since its own is only the masked number, the shop as its company and the operator serving the Instagram profile as its owner, since it has neither — the owner only when unowned profiles are within the operator's own view (Admin, Executive, Sales Manager, or a rep whose manager allows self-assignment); otherwise the profile stays unowned and routing assigns it. Its stage stays its own.

If something goes wrong

Someone else changed the customer first

If another operator has connected the conversation's customer since the dialog opened. EasyCRM shows: Someone else changed this conversation's customer. Look again before linking Nothing changes; the dialog closes and the panel shows the conversation's customer now.

The merge is refused

If either profile is anonymized, or has an erasure request that is pending or being processed, as a merge refuses on every path. EasyCRM shows the reason; nothing changes.

Someone else's customer

If a customer is owned by someone outside the operator's own view and the operator does not hold the *Merge Contacts* permission. EasyCRM shows the customer with Belongs to someone else — needs the Merge Contacts permission under it; it cannot be picked. If the picked customer has been given such an owner since the search (routing assigned it). EasyCRM shows the same sentence and returns to the results; nothing changes.

Good to know

Anyone who may reply in the conversation may connect its customer to an unowned profile or one within their own view; owning the two profiles is not needed. A profile owned by someone outside their view needs the *Merge Contacts* permission.
The search covers all of the company's customers but shows only what recognition needs, masked for everyone, and only through a conversation.
The existing profile keeps every value it has; it only fills what it lacks — a real name for one made from a masked number, a company, an owner, blank details — and keeps its stage, and an opt-out on either side wins.
There is no undo.