Import clients or contacts

Firm owners, admins, and employees with import access use this guide to bring many clients or contacts in from a spreadsheet. If Import is missing from the action bar, see Permissions and Visibility.

The flow differs by tab. Individual and Business upload the file and process in the background. CRM previews each row so you can start, stop, or skip during processing.

Before you start

• Confirm you are on Individual, Business, or CRM. The Groups tab does not support import.
• Have the right sample file for what you are doing. Individual and Business each have one sample for adding new records and another for updating existing ones. CRM has one.
• Save the file as .xlsx or .xls, up to 10 MB.

Prepare the spreadsheet

Open Import and download the sample file you need. On Individual and Business, select Download add sample under Add New Client Records, or Download update sample under Update Existing Client Records. On CRM, select Download sample file. Start from that file. The sample workbook has three rows above the data: a notes row, a row marking each column Required or Optional, and the header row. Fill in every column marked Required, then add your rows below.

The Business sample workbook also includes Shareholders and Directors sheets. Link a shareholder or director row to a client by entering the main row’s Sr. No. in the sub-row’s Main Sr.no. column.

Dates use the format YYYY-MM-DD.

Assigned employees on Individual and Business

In the sample files, Account Manager, Assistant, Bookkeeper, and Communicator must each contain an existing Employee Code, not an employee name.

A workbook exported from Individual or Business has two columns for each of these roles: the employee’s name (for example Account Manager) and the employee’s code (Account Manager Code). When your file has a code column, Assisterp reads the code. If a role has a name but its code cell is empty, the row fails with the message “Employee code is required for” that role.

Add new or update existing

On Individual and Business, use Add New Client Records to create clients and Update Existing Client Records to change clients that already exist. The update sample has a Client Code column, and every row in an update upload needs one. Assisterp marks a row without a Client Code as an error with the message Missing Client Code.

In either box, a row whose Client Code matches an existing client updates that client instead of creating a new one.

If a row’s Client Code matches an existing client but the row’s Contact Code does not match that client’s contact, the row fails with a conflict error.

On CRM, every row in the spreadsheet creates a new contact unless the row has an ID column value, which updates the matching contact. Client Code does not drive matching on this tab. The sample file does not include the ID column. To update existing contacts, add an ID column to your spreadsheet and fill it with the values you exported earlier from the same tab.

Import on Individual or Business

1. Open Individual or Business.
2. Select Import to open Import File.
3. In Add New Client Records or Update Existing Client Records, select Browse and choose your file. Once you choose a file, the other box is disabled. Select Remove file to choose a different one.
4. Select Upload.

Assisterp shows a green confirmation that the import is processing in the background. Select Click here in the confirmation to open the import progress page. You can close the window once the confirmation appears; processing continues until it finishes.

Import on CRM

1. Open CRM.
2. Select Import.
3. Select Download sample file if you do not have it yet.
4. Select Browse and choose your file. Assisterp loads the rows into a preview table.
5. Select the rows you want to process. Use the header checkbox to select all.
6. Select Start.

Each row turns green when a contact is created, yellow when an existing contact is updated, blue when there is no change, or red when the row fails. The footer counters show Total, Selected, Success, Fail, Creates, Updates, and No Change.

While the run is in progress, select Stop to pause processing, Skip to bypass the current failed row and continue, and Finish when you are done. A failed row shows its error message in the Error column, so you can copy the message, fix the row in your spreadsheet, and re-import.

Track progress and fix errors

The Click here link on the Individual and Business confirmation opens Imports > Sheets. The left panel lists past import batches. The right side has tabs for All Records, New, Success, In Progress, and Errors.

Open the Errors tab to deal with rows that failed. Select Export Errors to download the failed rows with their error messages. Select Edit Errors to fix values inline, then Save & Re-import to retry the corrected rows. The Refresh action re-checks the import status.

Troubleshooting

• The file is rejected: confirm it is .xlsx or .xls and under 10 MB.
• A row failed with a contact code conflict: the row’s Client Code matches an existing client whose Contact Code is different. Fix one of the codes, then re-import.
• A row failed with Missing Client Code: you uploaded it as an update, and the row has no Client Code. Add the code, then re-import.
• An assigned member was not found, or “Employee code is required for” a role: the Account Manager, Assistant, Bookkeeper, or Communicator value (or its code column, if your file has one) must be an existing Employee Code, not an employee name.