Email attached to incorrect contact

[matthart]

I have two contacts, both with different names.  The first contact was created and mistakenly assigned the email for the second.  The first contact has now been changed, but the second contact cannot be edited and will not save with correct email address.  Each time I try to edit the properties, it simply lists "email already exists" as an error message and all of the info that I have entered is not saved, including contact properties that are unrelated to email address like phone number.

What do I do?

[nicolebrenner]

Hi @Evan, welcome to the community. 

This is something that will need to be handled by someone on the HubSpot team. If you could send me a private message with following information, I can process this request for you:

1. The existing email address of the contact in HubSpot
2. The email address you are trying to update

[paddy_heliguy]

Hello 

I'm having the same issue - can you please assist?  Brett is no longer able to access the tools.

Many thanks

Paddy

[Sadiq]

Many thanks Brett!

[BrettLanguirand]

Hello @Sadiq,

I reached out to the HubSpot development team to have the email address freed up so that it can be used on a different contact record.  As soon as they let me know that it is all set, I will be sure to update you here.  Additionally, I'm going to edit your post to not include the full names and email addresses of your contacts.  It's somewhat private information that we wouldn't want to post without the contact's consent.  

Thanks,

Brett

[wedotraining]

A bug

This original email address should be freed up by default.

This is associated with not being able to edit a contacts email address.

How can this be set in stone? People change their email address all the time!?

[BrettLanguirand]

Hello @wedotraining,

I'm not quite sure what you mean when you say "This is associated with not being able to edit a contacts email address." - You can change any contacts email address in the Hubspot CRM manually.  

What the original poster is referring to is if two contact records are merged, then the email address that is not kept during the merge will be made unavailable for future use.  We can free up an email address if a customer requests it, but the main reason for making it unavailable is because when merging, the customer chooses which email address to keep.  When they then try to add the unavailable email address to a contact record afterwards, it lets them know that a contact already exists with that email address (because of the merge).  This prevents duplicate contact records with different email addresses. Here is more detailed information on what happens when you merge contacts.  

I hope this helps clear things up.

Brett

[BrettLanguirand · Accepted solution]

@matthart You should now be able to add Adam's email address to his contact record.

Let me know if you run into any problems.

Brett