Force Fromatting on Online Donation Forms

Muhammad Rasool

Anybody have issues with duplicate constituent records being automatically created when donors format their names and addresses differently to what is on file.


If so, have you found a workaround. 


Thx.


Mo

Jen Claudy

Are you reviewing the transactions (searching for existing records and linking them) when you go to download them to RE?  There are settings to tell RE/OLX what fields to match on, and it will use that criteria to auto-match as many as possible, but I find it's still necessary to review them all individually.  Otherwise, those transactions that match an existing RE record will have edits introduced based on what the donor typed in.


I see it as a flaw in OLX, because most of the time I keep what is in RE, not what the donor types in (i.e. different abbreviations, zip without the +4, wife's record is HOH but husband made the online donation).  Additional note: once you review the transactions, and uncheck fields you do not want updated, when you process the transactions, you must also change the selection on the second tab of the processing window to continue to reject updates...otherwise, all that time and effort you spent reviewing data will be dismissed and all updates will be included during processing.  You must make this selection every time (and if you're like me, you have to do it twice, because you forget that the button at the bottom isn't the [continue] button but a [close] button).


Hope this helps...if not, please clarify what you're experiencing.