“Unify” mode: no new record, the existing one is filled in
No new record is created. Only the empty fields in the existing record are filled in, nothing your team wrote is replaced, and the assignee doesn’t change.
Deduplication control is a paid Add-on.
The golden rule
Fill in what’s empty, add what’s missing, and never replace or delete.
Everything that’s refused shows as a warning that names it, such as “Email wasn’t applied”.
In chats
The chat is linked to the matching record with the most recent activity, and no record is created.
What doesn’t happen
Unifying doesn’t count as a “new record”, so the client isn’t distributed again by lead distribution. But it is an edit, so automations and Webhooks pick it up as an update.
If you can’t see the record
The merge happens even if the record is outside your permissions, but its data isn’t shown to you. You only see that the submission was merged.
The public form always gives the same reply, so it never reveals whether the person is already in your records.
A real example
A patient fills in the booking form twice in one day.
- Unify mode on “Patients”, matching on the WhatsApp number or email.
The second submission only fills in the missing data, and the record stays one, with its assignee.