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CONTACT HIERARCHY QUICKSTART GUIDE

With the contact categories you can classify your contacts and map contact hierarchies of e.g. companies or even create owner / heir communities. Individual multi-level hierarchies are possible.

Here is a short video on how to set up the contact hierarchy:

Activate the contact category

Please activate the contact category as follows:

Administration>> Input fields >> Module: Contact Management >> Category: Master data >> Contact category

Freischalten der Kontaktkategorie in der Administration

Once you have activated the contact category, the appropriate fields and field filters will be unlocked. These are already preconfigured, but can be customized by you. Do you have an individual field which, for example, should only be displayed for one company? Then add the contact category “Company” to the field filter of this field. You can find more information here.

What changes after activating and selecting the contact category?

By activating the contact category, a new single-select field “Contact category” is displayed in the contacts under the Customer number field. You can use this field to specify whether the open data record is a company or a private customer, for example. This directly displays the appropriate fields for the contact category. Among other things, “link fields” are displayed, which you can use to quickly add an contact record to an existing contact hierarchy or create a higher level  .

Good to know!

The postal address of a superordinate Contact record is transferred to the subordinate one.

Quickstartguide Adress-Hierarchie - Anlage eines neuen Unternehmens

Relationships

Anzeige der übergeordneten Kategorie sowie eventuellen weiteren Beziehungen.

The Relationship tab allows you to manage the relationships and the structures of the contacts. There, a distinction is made between two areas:

Superordinate level and subordinate level / contact > Hierarchy mapping of links, hierarchical relationships. Main contacts and sub-contacts > The linking of (natural) persons with each other, personal relationship.  Via the table “superordinate level/contact” you assign the opened contact to a legal entity (e.g. company) or an association (community of heirs). Under “Subordinate level/contact”, you assign other contacts to the open contact accordingly; this table is only available in all legal entities and associations. You can assign existing data records or create new ones in the tables.

Good to know!

The postal address of a superordinate Contact record is transferred to the subordinated one.

Graphical view of the hierarchy

The“Hierarchy View” button allows you to view a graphical representation of the relationships / links. In the view it is possible to open the respective record in a new tab by clicking on it. The hierarchy view can also be opened in the info bar via the icon.

List configuration

Existing list configurations must be adapted in the administration so that, among other things, the designations of e.g. communities of heirs can be output in a list. In the administration, the following lists in particular have to be adapted for the “Contacts” module:

  • Main list
  • Search result list
  • Last accessed records

Add the “Contact” (Available fields – Advanced) and “Contact category” (Available fields – General) fields to the Applied fields here. In the “Contact” column, all designation fields of all contact categories are output. (e.g. designation of the community of heirs, the company, etc.)

Notice: These manual steps were not automated on the part of onOffice, since the column arrangement of the lists was most likely already adapted to the customer needs in many clients and a possibly not meaningful classification would take place.

In various lists for contacts, each user can use the list configuration buttonbutton to add or move the Contact and Contact category fields independently.

New list tabs for contacts - filters

In a separate contact list tab, you can restrict the display to a contact category by selecting “Contact category” as “Mode” in the tab configuration and restricting the list to listing all companies, for example. If this list tab is open and you create a new record via the Plus button, it will now be created immediately, e.g. as a company.

Recipient Selection

A prerequisite for recipient selection is that the contact category (contact hierarchy) is enabled; this allows you, for example, to specify in the case of homeowners’ associations whether the association or its subordinate contacts should be contacted. If a contact has sub-levels, a “Recipient Selection” drop-down menu appears in the “Contact” category with the following options:

  • Only this contact
  • This contact and any subordinate contact(s)
  • Subordinate contact(s)

Use this selection to specify which recipient group from the contact hierarchy should be included in the cover letter. If you choose one of the options with sub-contacts, the entire tree will be broken down across multiple levels when the mailing is sent, and all relevant contacts will be included. If an email address is not on file for one of the contacts, this will not prevent the email from being sent—the contact in question will simply be skipped.

The recipient selection is displayed only for contact categories with the legal entity “legal person” or “association.” It applies exclusively to the hierarchical relationships “superordinate level” and “subordinate level / contacts” within the contact hierarchy—not to the personal relationships “primary contact” and “secondary contact.”

By default, recipient selection is handled by onOffice enterprise whenever an email is sent to the specified contacts. Invoices or receipts from Faktura are an exception—the recipient selection does not apply here.

The recipient selection feature DOES NOTapply when you compose emails using the onOffice app or the API.

Contacts