What is a Contact
Learn how Contacts work in Workglue, how they relate to Customer Accounts and Jobs, and how billing contacts sync to QuickBooks Online.
A Contact is a person in your Workglue database. Contacts can be linked to Customer Accounts, Jobs, or both, and the same Contact can be associated with multiple Accounts and Jobs at the same time.
Contacts are how Workglue tracks the people you communicate with, send invoices to, and coordinate work with on every project.
How Contacts relate to Customer Accounts
A Customer Account represents the entity you do business with, like a home, property, or company. Contacts are the people associated with that Account.
The relationship between Accounts and Contacts is flexible:
- An Account must have at least one Contact.
- A Contact does not need to be linked to an Account.
- A Contact can be linked to more than one Account at the same time. This is common for property managers who oversee multiple properties or general contractors who manage several projects.
When you create a Customer Account, you add a Primary Contact and optionally a Secondary Contact in the create form. After the Account is created, you can add additional Contacts to it. There is no cap on how many Contacts an Account can have.
How Contacts relate to Jobs
Contacts can also be linked directly to Jobs. A Contact does not have to be linked to the Account that owns the Job in order to be linked to the Job itself.
This is useful when the person you communicate with on a project is different from the person who owns the Account. A property manager might own the Account, but the on-site building manager is the day-to-day contact for the Job. You can link the building manager to the Job without adding them to the Account.
Contact roles
By default, Contacts in Workglue are just Contacts. They become a Primary, Secondary, or Billing Contact only when assigned that role on an Account or Job.
- Primary Contact: The main point of contact for an Account.
- Secondary Contact: A backup or additional point of contact for an Account.
- Billing Contact: The Contact who receives invoices. Billing Contact is a field on the Account and on individual Jobs, not on the Contact record itself. A Contact must be linked to the Account or Job before it can be assigned as the Billing Contact for that Account or Job.
Job-level Billing Contacts override Account-level Billing Contacts for that Job. This lets you bill different people for different Jobs under the same Account.
How Contacts sync to QuickBooks Online
If your company uses the QuickBooks Online integration, Contact data syncs to QBO based on Billing Contact assignment.
- If a Contact is designated as the Billing Contact on an Account or Job, that Contact's information syncs to QuickBooks Online.
- If no Billing Contact is designated, QuickBooks Online uses the Account's billing information instead.
This means only Billing Contacts appear in QBO. Other Contacts on the Account stay in Workglue for communication and coordination purposes but are not pushed to QuickBooks.
Contact fields
Contacts have their own set of fields separate from the Account. Required fields are:
- First Name
- Last Name
- Contact Phone (work)
Optional fields include Company, Title, Phone, cell, home, and other phone numbers, Website, Lead Source, marketing preferences (Marketing Accepted, Mail Marketing, Email Marketing), and Notes.
Marketing preferences on the Contact record are tracked separately from marketing preferences on the Account. This lets an Account opt in to email campaigns while letting an individual Contact at that Account opt out, or vice versa.
Where to find Contacts
To view all Contacts in your database:
- Go to Customers in the left navigation.
- Select the Contacts tab.
The Contacts list displays Contact Name, Email, Account, Cell Phone, Work Phone, and Home Phone. Contacts without an Account show a dash in the Account column. You can sort by any column and search or filter the list using the controls in the top right.