Manually Start a Constituent Merge Process

Warning: You can't undo a merge process. We highly recommend that you create a backup of your database prior to running the merge and/or run test merges in a non-production environment.

1. From Constituents, select Duplicates.

2. Select Constituent merge.

3. On the Merge processes tab, select a process, then select Start process.

4. The information displayed on the screen defaults in from the options configured when the process was added or last edited. Make changes as necessary.

   1. Under Duplicate record source, select whether to use the duplicate constituents identified by the last full or incremental duplicate search process run.

   2. Under Target constituent criteria, select the criteria to determine the target constituents.

      • To use the anchor record identified in the Duplicate constituent search process as the target, select "Automatic." For information about the determination of the anchor constituent, see Full and Incremental Duplicate Search Algorithm.

      • Otherwise, select whether to target constituents based on when they were added to the database, when they were last updated, or the number of gifts on the constituent record.

   3. To exclude constituents from the process, choose a selection under Excluded constituents.

   4. Under Minimum match %, enter the minimum match percentage to include source constituents in the process.

   5. To merge individuals only, select Only merge individuals.

   6. To exclude individuals matched with organizations, select Omit individual/organization matches.

   7. To delete source constituents after the merge, select Delete source constituent.

   8. To mark source constituents as inactive after the merge, select Mark source constituent inactive and choose a reason code to explain why you mark constituents inactive. In the Inactive details field, enter any additional information about the inactive status.

      Note: You can't merge records into inactive records that were previously a source record in a merge.

      Tip: For information about how to configure reason codes for inactive constituents, see Reason Codes.

5. To begin the merge, select Start. Depending on the number of records being merged, the duplicate merge process can take an extended period of time to run.

After the merge process completes, confirm that the duplicates have been merged by running the constituent search process again, then running the Duplicate Constituents Report again. View the report and verify that the duplicate records have been merged.

Duplicates that may not have been merged due to settings on the merge configuration appear under the Preview Merge tab on the process record. Review and manually merge as needed.