Recently we have introduced changes to how we match contacts in Datamolino. You can read more about it here: New Contact management in nutshell, here: How we match invoices and contacts and here: MERGE and EDIT your contacts
Main benefits
The contact matching process is now more complex, we've started using Company ID and VAT ID as primary keys for invoice and contact matching. Here is what you can expect:
Higher accuracy rate for extracted supplier and customer names (contacts)
Less duplicates and name variations - improves consistency of your data coding which enables for better management information.
Better syncing with your accounting system means less manual interventions. There is a much lower chance that Xero/QuickBooks contact is missing on your invoices because it's automatically paired.
All changes in contacts are remembered for all future invoices, not just historical ones.
Enables for scenarios when you need to group expenses of the same category under one contact (e.g. taxi, fuel expenses, etc).
The 'Folder Contacts' dashboard gives you a comprehensive overview of all contacts extracted by Datamolino. You can edit, merge and add new contacts here.
You can find it in your Folder menu on the top right in the navigation bar:
When to merge contacts?
Sometimes contact duplicates were created in the past for various reasons. If you find you have multiple contact records for the same supplier, merge them. This has two effects:
All invoices will be connected to the main contact after merging. This means less clutter.
In future, if one of the "merged contacts" variations is captured the invoices will be matched to the main contact. This means improved accuracy.
It is important to keep the contact details of the main contact accurate.
You can access the merge feature if you click Edit contact.
You will be presented with the Contact edit form that gives you an idea about how many other invoices use the same contact. It also gives you the possibility to Merge the contact with an already existing contact to prevent duplicates. This also prevents future duplicates.
When to edit a contact?
Keep your contacts accurate. Correct spelling errors. Make sure the the VAT ID and Company ID are correct (these are also use for matching contacts). Check if bank details are correct (this will be later used for invoice payments).
More details about the Folder Contacts feature:
You can now see and manage contacts for each Folder. These contacts are then used as master data to match to external accounting software. Previously this data was in the background. Now you have the ability to use it for your benefit.
This is also our preparation for new features that will use the contact details od your suppliers. Such as invoice payments.
Today, each invoice is assigned to an existing contact which can be edited or merged. The change will be reflected on all invoices assigned with this contact (historical and future ones too).
A new contact can be added manually if needed. Please note that new contacts are created automatically from new invoices.
Here are the steps how you can navigate throughout this dashboard:
You can see that the screen has tabs for Suppliers, Customers and also for Without documents and Other contacts. Here is an explanation of what each of these show.
Suppliers
This is the main tab. It shows all your supplier contacts from the Purchases subfolder.
Customers
If you use Datamolino to process Sales invoices, this will show your Customers based on the Sales subfolder.
Other contacts
On each invoice we may capture both the sender and recipient of the invoice. Other contacts are all contacts that are not your suppliers or customers. Normally you should see only your company name or its variations, because each folder typically serves one company to receive invoices. I.e. in the Purchases folder your supplier is one of the Suppliers and you are the "other contact". We reserved the Customers tab to show your customers in case you use the Sales subfolder to capture your sales invoices.
So in short. This filter serves certain edge cases. It contains all contacts that are not in Suppliers or Customers.
Without documents
Some contacts can become orphaned. This happens if all invoices matched with this contact have been permanently deleted. It an also happen that Datamolino has created a new contact based on captured data and you have manually changed the contact on the invoice to another contact. You can either choose to delete these contacts or merge them with existing contacts where applicable.
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