TntConnect TM
Helping you build powerful connections for a lifetime of ministry...
Adding/Editing a Contact

Contents


It is our pleasure to provide this software free of charge to help you in your ministry.  We're so thankful for our partners who make this possible!

About TntWare

Syndication

Adding/Editing a Contact

Print this Topic Previous pageReturn to chapter overviewNext page

Six Ways to Add Contacts

Each of these methods has pros and cons. Method and best reason to use this method:

Menu Path: Contact | New Contact

Adding an individual contact.

Menu Path: Contact | Add Referrals

You have just received several new names from an existing contact, and have very limited information about these new contacts.

Menu Path: File | Import | Import Contacts from Text

To import an existing database you have saved as a text file. Best for first-time users who have been managing their contacts in another software.

Menu Path: File | Import | Import Contacts from Outlook

To import an existing contact list from Outlook. You may find it easier to export from Outlook to text first.

If you are manually entering a set of contacts from paper.

Automatic Download from your organization’s donor files. (Both menu items do the same thing.)

File | Import | Update Donor Info

Tools | Update Donor Info

If your organization supports this method, this is a fast way to populate your database with those who have given financially. Note that the information your organization has on your ministry partners may not exactly match your list.

Adding/Editing a Contact

1.Press the desired button at the top of the screen.

You can also add contacts from the menu (Contact | New Contact)

You can edit contact information by double-clicking the yellow boxes on the Address tab, or clicking on the contact's name in the Name & Address Bar.

If the contact is an Organization, check the Organization box. When you do this, all of the personal name boxes will disappear, and only the Organization Name and Organization Contact Person fields will remain. When the contact is an organization, the default address and phone are Business instead of Home.

2.Enter the Name information.

If the contact is a single person (whether they are married or not), enter all of their information in the first column of boxes.
If they are married, put the husband's name in the first column and the wife's name in the second column. (Although the software will work either way, as a best practice it is better to be consistent with names in the database.)
If the wife has a different last name, uncheck the "Same Last Name" box and a last name box will appear for her.
Title can be a common title such as "Mr." "Mrs." (or one relevant to the language/culture) as well as honorary titles such as Pastor, Rev., Dr., or a military rank such as CAPT, GEN., etc. The list populates only from your entries, not a standard list of titles.
Suffix can be a name or a title. For example, it could be Jr, Sr, II, III, or it could be a title such as Ph.D., JD, or a military designation, etc.
3.Enter the address, phone, and e-mail by double-clicking in the yellow box.
4.Press OK.

Editing an individual entry in the address or phone

Double-click in any of the six boxes to edit just that item.

Other Name/Address Options

These two buttons allow for customization of individual names or addresses as they would appear on envelopes or in letters. In general you should not need to customize either greetings or mailing addresses.

Update the Greetings if you want to manually create a greeting for this contact. There are four different types of Greetings because different cultures may dictate different greetings depending on whether it is a letter, email, etc.

Update the Address Block if you need a unique address. For example, the address block may say "Mr. and Mrs. George Jetson", but you want it to say "Uncle George and Aunt Jane".

Tip: You can change the default entry order of either the name and/or the address on the options menu.

Read More > International Tab

Address Tips

Tip: Name & Address Bar hotspots

You can click (or double-click) on almost anything in the Name & Address bar and act on it

Picture [even if there is no picture]
Name & Address [to edit]
Phone number [to initiate a call task]
E-mail [to initiate an e-mail using your e-mail provider]
Summary Data: TNT Phase, Status Dot, or Monthly Average [opens the TNT Tab]
Summary Data: Organization Account Number [opens View Organization Info]

Tip: Using Titles or Not

TntConnect uses the Title (Mr/Mrs) to define the Full Name, which is used in the Mailing Address Block. When you do use titles, TntConnect will show only the husband's name in the Name & Address bar. However, the spouse's name will still be in the Current Group list.

Tip: Unknown spouse. Question: What if the contact is a couple but I do not know the husband's name?

Put the wife's name as the primary contact, and use "Mrs" in the title field to indicate she is married. In the Notes field, type something relevant that describes why his name is not in the name fields, such as "Husband unknown." or "Husband (Bill) does not know the Lord."

TntConnect is pretty flexible with names, but one thing it will not allow is a contact with a spouse (wife) name entered but not a primary name.

This is a more obvious issue when the husband is unknown because the guideline is that the husband's name always goes first. But when the husband is unknown, you have to choose how to resolve that. When the wife is unknown, you can treat the husband as if he is single, and TntConnect will not notice the difference.

Tip: Adjust Data Entry Order for names or addresses

If you do not like the order that names or addresses are entered, you can adjust them on the International Tab.

Menu Path: Tools | Options | International Tab

Tip: Address / Phone numbers out of sync with your organization

Out of sync. When a contact’s address/phone in TntConnect has an unresolved discrepancy with your organization’s address/phone, their address/phone will be bold and orange. There is a special Lookup just to find and resolve all these issues

Menu Path: Lookup | Unreviewed Account Info

Click on the red address or phone to view your organization's information.

If you see the organization's address is one you know is an old address, contact the office so they can update their address.

Note: TntConnect will only compare your organization's address with your database when you use the Update Donor Info feature. It will not make this comparison on an ongoing basis as you download gifts. When you do an Address Input from Web, it will clear any choices you made previously about whether to accept TntConnect or accept your organization.

To force your database to check addresses with your organization, select Tools | Update Donor Info

Tip: Mailing Address Block

Remember that for envelopes, TntConnect will ignore the recipient’s Country if it is the same as the country you are mailing from. This is defined in the Options. (More literally, this is pre-defined by TntConnect in a field called the "Mailing Address Block", which TntConnect creates by putting all the address fields together for the one address you have selected as the 'primary' address.)

You can manually modify the Mailing Address Block. You may want to do this when the block would have a unique wording. Press the <Addr Block> button on the address edit screen.

Example: You may want to address to "The Jetson Family" or "Uncle George & Aunt Jane".




Comments on this Help Topic

danielandmarie wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 24 Jan 2012 5:33 PM

I am a mac user. Can I import my contacts from address book? Thanks!

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 24 Jan 2012 5:54 PM

You would first have to export your address book to a CSV text file.  Then TntMPD can import this file.

danielandmarie wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 26 Jan 2012 5:54 PM

Can Address Book export to a CSV file? Whenever I do it, it looks like the only option is to export it as .abbu. Whatever that is! I realize this might be more of a question for the mac experts, but if you happen to know..... Thanks!

danielandmarie wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 26 Jan 2012 6:22 PM

I managed to export my address book to a .vcf file, then convert it to a .csv file; however, when I try to export it, I get this error message for every name: "A first, last or organization name must be entered for this contact. Do you want to continue? If you choose to continue, this record will be saved for future attempts?" If I hit "yes" it just scrolls to my next contact. All my contacts have first and last names, so I don't know why the error message comes up.

danielandmarie wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 26 Jan 2012 6:31 PM

Never mind! I fiddled with it a bit. And I got it. Thanks for your help!

Lee Bickerstaff wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 5 Feb 2013 1:38 AM

Almost every time I add a new contact I only have a cell phone number, but when I add the phone number through the "New Contact..." button the default label is "Home".  Can I make it to where "Mobile" is the default label for new contact phone numbers?

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 5 Feb 2013 3:48 PM

Unfortunately, that feature is not available (yet). When TntMPD was first written, mobile phones were only just becoming common--and home phones were still almost universal. So the "hard coded to home phone" reflects that history. Perhaps a future release may include that flexbility (click on the Suggestions link and give that idea:).

robolton wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 7 Feb 2013 7:17 PM

I'm having the problem danielandmarie mention above but haven't been able to figure it out. No answer was ever. posted. The comment is " when I try to export it, I get this error message for every name: "A first, last or organization name must be entered for this contact. Do you want to continue? If you choose to continue, this record will be saved for future attempts?" If I hit "yes" it just scrolls to my next contact. All my contacts have first and last names, so I don't know why the error message comes up."

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 7 Feb 2013 8:11 PM

This request (seeking a solution for a specific issue) is probably more best answered from the Forum. In my experience, this error usually occurs when incompatible fields are being entered. For example, if the name of an organization is being entered, it cannot have a person's name associated with it AND the "Is Organization" field must also be imported. These (and many others) are import nuances that are overcome with experience. If you are still having problems with this, send your request to the Forum directly to get more immediate help (only subscribers to feeds on the Guides will see this comment).

Dave Goetter wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 3 Jun 2013 4:03 AM

I converted my mac address book VCS file to CSV, but I am having similar problems trying to import it into tntMPD.  How do I do this?

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 3 Jun 2013 4:22 AM

Make sure you map your first name to "First/Given Name" and last name to "Last/Family Name" ... unless it's an organization, then just map the organization name to the "Organization Name" field.  Individual and organization names can't mix.

BobCarter wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 28 Nov 2014 6:48 AM

I have a problem:

when i imported a new batch of contacts    when i try to edit the address  it will not let me put in city or i should say when I do it put's a redline through it....then a line thru the name of the contact....did i hit a button that is causing this or what?    

I have 100 + names that it is fine

even if I try to add a single new contact it is doing the same

BobCarter wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 28 Nov 2014 6:48 AM

I have a problem:

when i imported a new batch of contacts    when i try to edit the address  it will not let me put in city or i should say when I do it put's a redline through it....then a line thru the name of the contact....did i hit a button that is causing this or what?    

I have 100 + names that it is fine

even if I try to add a single new contact it is doing the same

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 6 Dec 2014 5:49 PM

Sounds like you imported into the "Home Address Is Deliverable" field and marked it "False".  You can manually fix this by checking the "Deliverable" box above the address.  Or do a Group Actions | Mass Change a Field do set "Home Address is Deliverable" to True for all contacts in the current group/lookup.

JohnHaller wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 29 Apr 2015 3:26 AM

Can you combine contacts?  I have an excel sheet that has the husband and wife entered in separate rows.

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 5 May 2015 10:06 PM
Ali Dixon wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 2 Aug 2016 9:27 PM

I downloaded contacts from my organization but some of the info is not the same as the same contacts that I put into Tnt. How do I handle merging two contacts? Also, in the future as I update the information, how do I handle this so the right information will stay in tact?

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 5 Aug 2016 2:51 PM

When you download donors from your organization, you should have been prompted to match them to your existing contacts in TntConnect.  That way you wouldn't end up with duplicates.  To merge two duplicates:  www.tntware.com/.../how-can-i-merge-combine-two-contacts-into-one.aspx

KarenDodson wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 3 Feb 2017 7:38 PM

When I put a new contact into TNT I put a Title of "Dr & Mrs" but it doesn't show up anywhere else. I expected it would show up in the address box or at least as one of the greetings. What am I missing?

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: Adding/Editing a Contact
on 20 Apr 2017 11:33 PM

If you add an address, you'll see the title in the address block under the "Address" tab.

© 2024 TntWare, Inc. | Privacy | Terms of Use