Manage contacts associated with public user accounts

Follow the instructions below to manage the associations between public user accounts and contacts. You can associate a contact with a public user; approve, reject, or remove the association; or set a contact as the account owner of a public user.

Associate contacts with a public user account

To associate contacts with a public user account

From the Administration menu, select System tools > Public user.
Highlight the user account you want to edit.
From the user account registration details, select the Contact tab.
Do any of the following:
- To search and associate a contact with a public user account.
  1. Select Look up.
  2. Enter your search criteria and then select Submit.
  3. If you cannot find the contact in the results list, select Close matches to view the close matches to the search criteria, and select the contact from the close match contacts.
    
    Note: The close matches feature requires that the standard choices INDIVIDUAL_CONTACT_MATCH_CRITERIA and ORGANIZATION_CONTACT_MATCH_CRITERIA are configured and enabled respectively for individual contacts and reference contacts.
  4. Select the check box next to the contact that you want to associate with the public user.
  5. Select Connect.
    
    Note: For contacts directly added in the public user portlet, Civic Platform approves the association by default.
- To approve the association between a contact and the public user account.
  1. Select the check box next to the contact to approve.
  2. Select Approve.
- To reject the association between a contact and the public user account.
  1. Select the check box next to the contact that you do not want to approve the association.
  2. Select Reject.
    
    Note: A public user account must have at least one approved contact association to stay enabled. You cannot reject an association if it is the last one with the approved status in an enabled public user account.
- To delete the association between a contact and the public user account.
  1. Select the check box next to the contact that you want to remove.
  2. Select Delete.

Set an associated contact as the account owner

A public user may be associated with more than one contact, but only one contact can be the account owner of the public user. Public users can designate or change the account owner in their accounts on the Account management page in Citizen Access. You can also designate or change the account owner of a public user account following the instruction in this section.

Note: If your agency enables the Automatically Activate New Association feature in Citizen Access, the first contact added to an account is the account owner of the account by default.

When you add variables (for example, $$firstName$$, $$middleName$$, $$lastName$$) about the public user contact information in notification templates, Civic Platform uses the following priority order to decide from which contact, out of all the contacts that have approved association with the public user, to get the variable values:

Priority one, the account owner of the public user
Priority two, the first individual contact that has the same email address as the account
Priority three, the first organization contact that has the same email address as the account
Priority four, the first individual contact that has approved association with the account
Priority five, the first organization contact that has approved association with the account

For more information about how to create notification templates, see Create, edit, and delete communication notification templates.

To change the account owner of a public user

From the Administration menu, select System tools > Public user.
Highlight the user account you want to edit.
From the user account registration details, select the Contact tab.
Select the check box next to an approved contact which you want to set as the account owner of the public user.
Select Set as account owner.