How do I record who else is involved with a customer, like a parent or the person who pays?

Some customers come with other people: a student's parent who pays the fees, a home buyer's partner, a client's lender or insurer, the other side in a case. Linking keeps that on the customer's record, so anyone on your team can see who else is involved and how. Both people stay their own contacts; a link only says how they are connected.

Nothing changes for a customer you never link. There is no setting to turn on: linking is there when you need it.

Link a person

1. Open the customer's page. In the Compliance and record details card, under Linked people, click Link a person.
2. Search for the other person by name, email or phone, and select them. If they are not in your contacts yet, see "Add someone who is not in your contacts yet" below.
3. Pick how they are connected, for example "parent or guardian", "pays for them", "lender" or "their lawyer, accountant or doctor". If none fits, pick Other and type a short label (up to 40 characters), such as "case worker".
4. Click Link. A Linked people card appears on the customer's page with the person's name and how they are connected. Their name opens their own page.

Add someone who is not in your contacts yet

1. Click Link a person, then open the Add a new person tab.
2. Type their first name, and their last name, email and phone if you have them. Only the first name is needed here.
3. Leave Not a customer themselves ticked if they are only connected to this customer, like a parent or a lender. They are then kept off your journeys and automatic messages. Untick it if they are a customer in their own right.
4. Pick how they are connected, then click Add and link. They are saved as a new contact and linked in one step.

Adding a person here never records marketing consent for them. If their email or phone already belongs to another contact, you are told and nothing is saved: use the In your contacts tab to link that contact instead. If the person is saved but the link fails, you are told, and they appear picked on the In your contacts tab so one click on Link finishes it.

How each side reads it

A link shows on both people's pages, worded from each side. If you link Raj to Priya as "parent or guardian", Priya's page shows Raj as her parent or guardian, and Raj's page shows Priya as his child. If Raj "pays for them", Raj's page shows Priya as "they pay for them".

The kinds you can pick: parent or guardian, partner, family member, pays for them, employer, co-buyer or co-owner, lender, insurer or adjuster, their lawyer, accountant or doctor, the other side, and Other with your own label. You can also pick the other way round, for example that the person you are adding is the customer's child, or their employee.

Who pays

When an admin links someone as "pays for them", the link is marked Gets payment requests. A customer can have only one person marked this way. When someone who is not an admin makes the link, it is saved without the mark. An admin can turn "Payment requests go to them" on or off on the person's row at any time. See How do I keep a linked person off my customer journey and automatic messages? for what the person who pays receives.

Change or remove a link

1. On either person's page, find them in the Linked people card and open the menu at the end of their row.
2. Click Change to pick a different connection, then Save. Whether they get payment requests stays as it was, unless the change swaps who the customer is: then payment requests stop going to them until an admin turns it back on.
3. Click Unlink, then Unlink again to confirm. Both people stay in your contacts; only the link goes. When the last link goes, the Linked people card goes with it.

When you merge contacts

Links move to the contact you keep. If both contacts were linked to the same person, the contact you keep keeps its own link. A link between the two contacts you merged is removed, and if both had someone marked as paying, the contact you keep keeps its own.

Who can do this

Anyone on your team, admin or advisor, can link, change and unlink people, as long as your account has task management turned on (the same as merging contacts). Only an admin's link to someone who "pays for them" is marked Gets payment requests.