GNM_RCS_Contributor_Deduplication_and_Merging_TS

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• 1. .Introduction

     1. Purpose

The document GNM_RCS_Contributor_Management_FS.docx is the functional specification that describes what business functions RCS supports in relation to Contributors.

This document is one of a set of technical specifications that provide details of how those functions are implemented in RCS.

• 1. Scope

This document focusses on the contributor de-duplication and merging requirements:

• • Identification of candidate duplicates

  • Resolving candidate duplicates

  • Merging contributors

This document is intended as a high-level technical document outlining how the relevant business functions are implemented in terms of software modules.

Importantly, this document does not aim to provide the level of detail that would be required in a programming specification in areas such as program structure, detailed business rules, data integrity, validation, locking considerations, data security, and calls to/from other software modules, performance considerations, and so forth.

For details of program logic and coding, the reader should refer to the program files themselves.

• 1. .Technical design

     1. Identification of candidate duplicates

        1. Duplicated contact details

Contributor data is maintained in a number of places in RCS:

• • Individuals screen

  • Organisations screen

  • Agents screen

  • NCS screen

  • Contributor, Payee, and Agent popup windows throughout the system

The layouts for each of these screens are provided in other technical specifications, and so are not repeated here.

Software embedded in these screens identifies potential duplicates by looking for duplicated data that one might ordinarily expect to uniquely identify a contributor. Whenever a new contributor is entered onto the system, or an existing contributor’s contact details are changed, the newly entered contact details are compared against those of all other contributors, as follows:

• • contact name and company name

(NB it is not uncommon for two people to have the same name)

• • address

(NB multiple contributors may live at the same address)

• • UK postcode

(NB multiple contributors may share the same postcode)

• • email address

(NB multiple contributors may share the same postcode)

• • phone / mobile / fax / ISDN number

When a candidate duplicate is identified the user receives a warning message, and can choose whether to proceed or cancel what they are doing. If they proceed a record of the issue (i.e. the similar contributors) is written to the DUPLICATE_SUPPLIERS table, to be reviewed at a later date.

• 1. Duplicated VAT numbers

VAT numbers provide another means of identifying duplicate contributors. VAT numbers are supplied to RCS by means of database messages received from Oracle AP.

Upon receipt of a new or changed VAT number from Oracle AP a check is made that the VAT number does not already exist in RCS against another supplier. If it does a record of the issue (i.e. the relevant contributors) is written to the DUPLICATE_SUPPLIERS table.

• 1. Payments processing

RCS puts payment instructions to Oracle AP on hold if the payee/contributor has been identified as a potential duplicate and the matter has yet to be resolved.

• 1. .Resolving candidate duplicates

It is not possible for RCS software to “know” if a candidate duplicate is an actual duplicate or not – this requires manual checking by the RCS Administrator, and so a queue is provided and is regularly monitored.

• 1. Accessing the screen

Housekeeping → Suppliers → Duplicates

This opens an Oracle Form named rcs_cpro_080_pc.fmb

As the screen opens it queries all new candidate duplicates, and ignoring VAT duplicates at this stage.

The left hand side of the screen lists all the contributors who may be a duplicate of another contributor, and the right hand side lists the (other) contributor(s) that may be duplicates of the current record on the left.

The data that appears to be duplicated is highlighted to make the job of the user easier.

By changing the radio group in the centre of the screen the user can query chased and cleared (i.e. resolved) duplicates in case information needs to be added or changed.

Another radio group below this one allows the user to see the duplicates that were identified purely by their VAT numbers.

• 1. Investigating candidate duplicates

The user can add notes by pressing the “Notes” button: a new window opens in which the user can indicate that they are investigating e.g. contacting the contributor.

• 1. Clearing/rejecting candidate duplicates

If the candidate duplicate is determined not to be an actual duplicate, then the user can press the Clear button at the top of the main screen to remove it from the queue. Again the user could use the Notes window to document their decision.

• 1. Processing/merging confirmed duplicates

If the user confirms a duplicate they may first need to tidy up the data on the record they intend to keep, before deleting the other record. For example one record may have the correct email and telephone number, whereas the other may have the correct current address. To facilitate processing, double clicking on any field causes the data in that field (only) to be copied to the corresponding field on the other side of the screen.

To resolve duplication a merge must be processed. This is done by pressing either of the double arrowed buttons under the Merge label:

• • The arrows pointing to the right remove the contributor record on the left and keep the one on the right. Any commissions, contracts, expenses etc. associated with the contributor on the left are migrated to the contributor on the right;

  • The arrows pointing left do the same thing but in reverse.

When a merge is performed an email is sent to Accounts Payable instructing that the same merge must be performed in Oracle AP. NB This only happens if RCS has already sent the details of both contributors to Oracle AP.

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• 1. Merging contributors

If two contributor records need to be merged, for example due to a merger between two organisations, then the software previously described for merging candidate duplicates is reused, albeit with slightly different behaviour.

• 1. Accessing the screen

Housekeeping → Suppliers → Merge

This opens an Oracle Form named rcs_cpro_080_pc.fmb as before.

This is the same Form that is used for processing duplicate suppliers, but it now behaves a little differently. When run from this menu option the screen opens in query mode allowing the user to query the two suppliers they need to merge (on the left and right of the screen) and then to process the merge using one or other of the merge buttons.

• 1. Merging contributors

Merging contributors in this screen is exactly as already described in the previous section and so is not repeated here.

End of Document