Attendee Import - Skipping Records Based on Duplicate First Name and Title

[swessels]

We are pushing our users to add all attendees for our tax reporting.  We are finding that when we have a large import with repeated first names, attendee type (code) and titles (even with different last names and companies), it is "skipping" those records and noting them as "Attendees skipped - already listed for your expense."  Our workaround is to create a unique title (i.e Unknown1, Unknown2), but this is a pain.  Is anyone else experiencing this?

[cjmarimo]

hello @swessels 

We are planning a training course to explain to our company employees the massive import of "Invitations Business Guest". And in the tests we have not found any problem.

We have created a template for each idoma in: Administratio->Expense->Attendee Import Templates

The format of our excel file to import is as follows, steps:

And the import result is:

And when you add attendees:

BR,

cj

[swessels]

It looks like you are testing with unique first names.  Our issue is when the first name and title is the same even with unique company names and unique last names, the attendees are skipped.

[PoojaKumatkar · Accepted solution]

Hi @swessels ,

I think I have identified the cause why this is happening. It must be happening because of below settings.

Here, I have used your screenshot for my analysis.  Here if you see, first name, attendee title and company name same combination is occurring multiple times. 

Now you go to backend configuration if you have Expense Configuration Administrator (unrestricted or restricted) access. 

Go to Attendees configuration item >> attendee type tab >> Double click to open "TRADEPAR" attendee type >> Here, under field for duplicate search it must have selected First name, Attendee title and company for the duplicate check. This is backend attendee configuration.

This must be the reason, system is rejecting such records.

Tested with exactly same combinations given in your screenshot, keeping last name unique and same first name, title, company name.

with exactly above settings for duplicate check.

3 got successfully uploaded as it is 1st unique occurrence (yellow), remaining green and purple records are occurring 2nd time and so on. so, 4 records got rejected.

Please try this.

Done for today. 

[swessels]

This worked!  You are amazing.  Thank you so much!!!!

[PoojaKumatkar]

Hi @swessels ,

Just to understand your issue, I replicate the same scenario in our sandbox, and I got to know that system behavior is correct. To make you understand what is happening, I have listed below two test cases for you, hope it will help you to clear your understanding.

Test Case 1: 

1. Create one expense entry, lets say parking and add attendees using import.
Click Add and Import below 3 attendees with exactly same information given in my template. This is unique combination where first name is same for all 3 records and we are importing these attendees in system for the 1st time.

Now attendees got added into my expense entry as shown below.

2. Now again import same template. Here we are importing same attendees for the 2nd time which are already added as attendees against parking expense type.

This time you will get error "Attendees Skipped - Already listed for your expense". Meaning, attendees are already linked against parking expense types and you cannot again link same set of attendees to it.

Test Case 2: 

1. Create another expense entry, lets say taxi.
2. Click Add and Import same attendee template which you imported for parking expense type.

3. Attendees will get added against taxi expense type.

4. Now remove all 3 attedees manually and again import same template.

5. This time also it will get successfully imported without giving attendee skipped error. Why? Because system doesn't find any attendee which is already linked with taxi expense type.  You already removed those 3 Attendees in Step 4. 

Testing Conclusion - Skipped attendee error will only get triggered if attendees are already added and linked against that particular expense type.

Hope now your confusion is got cleared.

If this answers your query, then please mark solution as accepted.

[swessels]

Unfortunately, that is not what happened for us.  When the Attendee Type, First Name and Title were the same even if the last name and Company was unique, it was skipping them - even through they were not already in the expense.