If you end up with two contact records for the same person — say, one created manually and one pulled in from a CSV import — TripLoft does not currently have an automatic "merge" button. Merge contacts functionality is planned, but until it ships, consolidating duplicates is a manual process. This article walks through how to do it safely, without losing trips or notes attached to either record.
Note: There is no one-click "Merge" action on contacts today. If you see messaging elsewhere in the product mentioning merge is coming soon, that feature has not shipped yet — use the manual steps below in the meantime. |
Why duplicates happen
TripLoft blocks you from creating an exact duplicate on purpose: if you try to create a new contact with the same first name, last name, and email address as an existing one, you'll get "A client with the same data already exists." (See the "Why am I getting a duplicate error?" section of Creating a Contact.)
That check only catches exact matches on all three fields. Duplicates still slip through when:
A contact is imported via CSV with a slightly different spelling, an extra middle initial, or a different email than the existing record.
The same person is added manually by two different team members before either one searches for the existing record.
A contact's email changes over time and a new record gets created instead of updating the old one.
During CSV import, TripLoft does run a duplicate check — it flags any row that matches an existing contact on first name, last name, and email, and skips adding those rows automatically. If you see a "Duplicate Contacts Found" screen during import, those exact matches were already caught for you; this article is for duplicates that get through some other way.
Step 1: Find the duplicate
Use the tools on the Contacts list to track down both records:
Search: search by name, email, or phone to pull up every contact that might be the same person.
Filter: narrow by contact type, tag, or status if a search turns up too many results, or if you suspect the duplicate was archived rather than deleted.
Full details on both tools are in Search, Filter, Archive, and Delete Contacts.
Step 2: Decide which record is the "primary"
Open both contact profiles and compare them. Pick the one to keep as your primary record — usually the one with:
More trips, notes, or activity history attached.
The more current or complete contact info (correct email, phone, tags).
The record travelers or other systems are already linked to.
The other record is the one you'll consolidate away in the steps below.
Step 3: Move trips and notes over to the primary record
Before you archive or delete the duplicate, move anything of value off it — there's no automatic transfer, and TripLoft won't let you delete a contact that's still linked to a trip.
Trips
Open each trip attached to the duplicate contact and go to its Travelers tab. Add the primary contact as a traveler on the trip, then remove the duplicate contact from that trip's traveler list. Repeat for every trip linked to the duplicate.
Notes
Notes are attached permanently to whichever contact they were created on — there's no "move note to another contact" action. If the duplicate has notes worth keeping, open them, copy the content, and add a new note with that content on the primary contact before you archive or delete the duplicate.
Tip: if the duplicate has a long note history, it's often faster to archive it (see below) instead of deleting it — archived contacts stay searchable, so you can always go back and copy over anything you missed.
Step 4: Archive or delete the duplicate
Once every trip has been moved to the primary contact and any notes you need have been copied over, clean up the duplicate:
Delete: permanently removes the contact. TripLoft blocks deletion with "This client is linked to an existing trip and therefore can't be deleted" if any trip is still attached — go back to Step 3 and confirm every trip has been moved first.
Archive: sets the contact to inactive instead of deleting it. Use this if you're not fully sure yet, or if you want to keep the record around for historical search without it cluttering your active contact list.