Handling of Contacts with Multiple Accounts in SAP CRM
SAP CRM supports multiple accounts for a contact, however, only one account can be assigned to a contact in the groupware client. This section describes the logic applied during the download of contacts with multiple accounts assigned in SAP CRM. Note that the software behaves differently for owned contacts (for which the current user is employee responsible) and account team contacts.
A contact is downloaded if the groupware user (CRM business partner) is assigned to the contact with at least one of the relationship categories that are set as a download prerequisite in Customizing. You specify the relevant relationship categories in Customizing for Customer Relationship
Management, under 
CRM Middleware and Related Components
Client-Based Groupware Integration
Settings for Client-Based Synchronization
using the following parameters (for more information,
see the Customizing documentation, and the description below):
REL_NAME_MY_ACCOUNTS
REL_NAME_MY_CONTACTS
REL_NAME_WRITE_MY_ACCOUNTS
REL_NAME_WRITE_MY_CONTACTS
Owned Contacts
Owned contacts are contacts for which the user’s SAP CRM business partner has one of the relationships entered in Customizing for the parameter REL_NAME_MY_CONTACTS
. These contacts are downloaded to the groupware client if the option Download from
CRM: Owned Contacts
is selected in the synchronization settings (Synchronization
page: Contact Person Synchronization Settings
).
Example
You download a contact C1 (for which you are the employee responsible) from SAP CRM to Microsoft Outlook. Contact C1 is assigned to three different accounts in SAP CRM: A100, A200, and A300. During synchronization, contact C1 is downloaded to Microsoft Outlook with account A100 assigned to it.
You remove the assignment of contact C1 to account A100 in Microsoft Outlook. All the data is removed in Microsoft Outlook as a result. When you synchronize, the relationship between contact C1 and account A100 is lost in SAP CRM.
Contact C1 is assigned to accounts A200 and A300 in SAP CRM. A200 is synchronized to the groupware client as it has the next lowest account ID. If you remove the assignment of contact C1 to account A200, when you synchronize, the relationship between contact C1 and account A200 is lost in SAP CRM.
Account Team Contacts
Account team contacts are the contacts assigned to an account for which the user’s SAP CRM business partner has one of the relationships maintained in the Customizing parameter REL_NAME_MY_ACCOUNTS
. These contacts are downloaded if the option Download
from CRM: Contacts for Accounts Where User Belongs to Account Team
is selected in the synchronization settings (Synchronization
page: Contact Person Synchronization Settings
). All contacts that belong to the account owned by
the user are downloaded, even if they do not have any relationship with the user’s business partner.
If the user's business partner has a relationship with the contact, user's business partner name is displayed as CRM Employee Responsible
in the Relate to SAP CRM
screen area. If another person is the responsible business partner
for the contact, that business partner is displayed. If there is no responsible business partner for a contact, no employee responsible is displayed.
Each contact that is part of the account team typically has one or more accounts assigned to it. The account with the lowest ID, and to which the user's business partner is assigned, is displayed in the Relate to SAP CRM
screen area for the downloaded contact.
If you remove the account assignment for an account team contact in the groupware client and any other account exists for this contact, to which the user's business partner is assigned, the account with the lowest ID is displayed in the Relate to SAP CRM
screen area. However,
if there is no such assignment, this contact is deleted from the groupware client during the next synchronization.
Note
If the option Download from CRM: Contacts for Accounts Where User Belongs to Account Team
is deselected after downloading the account team contacts, these contacts are deleted from the groupware client during the next synchronization.
Example
The synchronization option Download from CRM: Contacts for Accounts Where User Belongs to Account Team
is selected.
The user Emp1 is employee responsible for the accounts A1 and A2.
Account A1 has the following contacts assigned to it:
Contact C1: Employee responsible is Emp1; Contact is assigned to accounts A1 and A3
Contact C2: No employee responsible; Contact is assigned to accounts A1 and A2
Contact C3: Employee responsible is Emp1; Contact is assigned to accounts A1, A2, and A3
Contact C4: Employee responsible is Emp2; Contact is assigned to account A1
Account A2 has the following contacts associated with it:
Contact C2: No employee responsible; Contact is assigned to accounts A1 and A2
Contact C3: Employee responsible is Emp1; Contact is assigned to accounts A1, A2, and A3
Contact C5: No employee responsible; Contact is assigned to accounts A2 and A3
Contact C6: Emp2 is responsible; Contact is assigned to accounts account A2
The result in the groupware client after synchronization is as follows:
Contact |
CRM Employee Responsible |
CRM Account |
|---|---|---|
C1 |
Emp1 |
A1 |
C2 |
None |
A2 |
C3 |
Emp1 |
A2 |
C4 |
Emp2 |
A1 |
C5 |
None |
A2 |
C6 |
Emp2 |
A2 |
If the accounts mentioned above are unassigned for each of the contacts, the result in the groupware client after synchronization is as follows (if the Download from CRM: Owned Contacts
option is selected):
Contact |
CRM Employee Responsible |
CRM Account |
|---|---|---|
C1 |
Emp1 |
A3 |
C2 |
Emp1 |
A1 |
C3 |
Emp1 |
A1 |
C4 is deleted from the groupware client |
N/A |
N/A |
C5 |
Emp1 |
A3 |
C6 is deleted from the groupware client |
N/A |
N/A |
If the accounts mentioned above are unassigned again for each of the contacts C1, C2, C3 and C5, the result in the groupware client after synchronization is as follows:
Contact |
CRM Employee Responsible |
CRM Account |
|---|---|---|
C1 |
Emp1 |
None |
C2 |
Emp1 |
None |
C3 |
Emp1 |
A3 |
C5 |
Emp1 |
None |