---
title: "Managing contacts"
description: "Customer records live under Contacts. This section covers linking two records that are one person, duplicate records, and messaging a customer first."
updated: "2026-08-28"
audience: [agent, administrator]
source: "https://helpdesk-docs.svr1.feedapp.click/en/lien-he"
---

Everyone who writes to you has a record under **Contacts**. This section is
about keeping those records matched to the real people behind them.

## Why one person ends up with several records [#why-one-person-ends-up-with-several-records]

A customer who writes from Facebook and later from Zalo has two records. The
two platforms do not tell each other who that person is, so nothing in the data
can work it out. The only machine-readable evidence is a matching email address
or phone number, and the system already acts on that when it creates a record.

The rest is a person's work: an operator recognizes that two records are one
customer and says so.

## Pages in this section [#pages-in-this-section]

* [Link two records as one person](/en/lien-he/lien-ket-ho-so) — declare that
  two records are one customer, and take it back when they are not.
* [Merge two duplicate contacts](/en/lien-he/gop-lien-he) — what the **Merge**
  tab does today, and what to reach for instead.
* [Start a conversation from a contact](/en/lien-he/mo-hoi-thoai-tu-lien-he) —
  write first to a customer who already has a record.

## Before you link anything [#before-you-link-anything]

A wrong link puts one customer's history inside another customer's information
panel, and your colleagues will answer from what they read there. Be sure
before you press it.

Customers are unaffected: the website chat window and the customer portal read
conversations through a different query, which does not follow links. Linking
is also reversible, and the name of whoever made it is kept.

Any operator account can read the contact list. The link and unlink controls
appear only for an account that may write in conversations — see
[Roles and per-feature permissions](/en/khai-niem/vai-tro-va-quyen).