Phillip SweeneyTo accurately track the number of times the customer has rented and to streamline the customer records, it is desirable to merge these multiple customer records into one. The Data De-Duplication logic is designed to find records that are possible duplicates, provide a report of those records, allow for editing, and process the records.
Philip Sweeney
Phil Sweeney
Phillip Sweney
Phil Sweeny
A. VALIDATE CUSTOMER TYPES
In Edit Misc Control Fields, there is a field that controls whether or not customer types are validated. (Page 2, Field 7). This field should be set to "Y" for each customer type that should be included in the data de-duplication process.B. SET A CUSTOMER TYPE CODE FOR OLD CUSTOMER RECORDS
User tip: Usually wholesale (tour), insurance replacement, and direct bill customer types are NOT included.
When the de-duplication is processed, a Customer Type is assigned to the old customers who should no longer be used. If one does not already exist, set up a new Customer Type code for this purpose in Edit Customer Type Codes.
The fields for "Allow Rentals" and "Use as Bill-to" should be set to "N".
Example:
| OPTION: __ EDIT CUSTOMER TYPE CODES 1 Type Code PRG 2 Description PURGE 3 Statement Cycle 21 Prompt MRA 4 Terms Code 22 No MRA type 5 Finance Charge 23 Dedup Priority (1=high, 99=low) 6 Credit Limit 24 OptSet 7 A/R Account 25 Req. Company tax id? 8 Special Logic (D=dealer, I=insurance, W=wholesale, V=vip) 9 Billing Format 26 Use as FOP 10 Allow Rentals N 27 Block Rate 11 Require PO# (Y/N)? 28 Edit Name 12 Use as Bill-to N (Y=yes, N=no, O=only,B=Backup) 13 Balance Method 29 Edit Address 14 Corporate Standard 30 Edit DOB 15 Vchr Cust Only (Y/N)? 31 Edit Gender 16 Hide Rates (Y/N)? 32 Edit DL data 17 Tax Code 33 Edit DL expiry 18 Store CDPID 34 Edit Phone 19 Prevent Ed.Cls.Rat 35 Edit other ID 20 Exempt from Alt ID 36 Edit Type 1SAVE 2NEXT 3ERASE 4DELETE 5BACKUP 6 7HELP 8 NXT PAGE |
C. EXEMPTING CERTAIN CUSTOMER RECORDS FROM THE DE-DUPLICATION PROCESS
A field in Edit Customer Type Codes can be used to exempt certain Customer Types from the de-duplication logic. Entering '99' in Field 23 prevents customers with that Customer Type from being included in the de-duplication processing. This is a very important tool and is a way to allow processing for certain Customer Types and not others.D. INFLUENCING THE SURVIVOR CHOICE
In the Customer Type Code record, the same field that exempts Customer Types (see paragraph above) can also be used to influence which type of customer is chosen as the surviving record. Generally, the record with the most recent modification date is flagged as the "survivor" record. However, if priority codes have been set up in the Customer Type records, the Customer Types with the lowest number priority number will be the chosen as the survivor. Refer to the chapter in Edit Customer Type Codes and the chapter Select Records for De-Duplication for more details on priority codes.
A. SELECT RECORDS FOR DE-DUPLICATION
This program reads through the Customer File and "nominates" records that meet the criteria for being merged together. Selection is based on such things as matching drivers license and date of birth, or name and address. Details of what data needs to 'match' in order to be nominated are in the chapter Select Records for De-Duplication.
After reading through the customer file, the program produces a report of the records it selected, indicates which record it chose to be the survivor, and queues the records for processing.
Running this program again at a later time without having processed the records (in Process Data De-Duplication) will cause any new records to be added to the file. To delete a file that was already built but never processed, ask Thermeon's Customer Support Dept. to initialize the file.
B. EDITING DE-DUPLICATION RECORDS
The Edit De-Duplication Records program offers the following functions:
It allows the user to delete or edit the records that the Select program nominated for merging.
It can be used to manually enter customer records which the user desires to merge into one customer record without running the Select program at all.
It can be used to display or print an edit list of the records that are currently nominated for the de-duplication process.
For details refer to the chapter Edit De-Duplication Records.
C. PROCESSING DATA DE-DUPLICATION
WARNING: Once Data De-Duplication is run, it can not be un-done! Therefore, be sure that the nominated records have been reviewed and edited as necessary before processing!This program does the actual merging of the nominated records into a single customer record. The program also rewrites all references of the obsolete customer records to those of the surviving customer record in all other files (every reservation, RA, DEPPAY record, etc. in the system must be checked).
Obsolete Records: The customer type is changed and the drivers license number on the obsolete customer records is modified.
The processing can be quite slow. For certain users, this program may have a noticeable impact on the performance of other users. Therefore, it is suggested that this program be done during off hours.
For details refer to the chapter Process De-Duplication Records.