Review possible duplicates

When someone applies who might already be in your program, TRIOPilot never guesses. The application always comes in as its own new record, and if it looks like it could belong to someone already on file, the new record gets a rose flag reading Possible duplicate of followed by the names it matched. The applicant is never interrupted, and nothing is linked automatically. You make the call, on your schedule.

A record gets flagged when it shares any of these with someone already in your program: the same email address, the same first name, last name and date of birth, or the same phone number and date of birth. Matching only ever looks inside your own program, so the same person in another TRIO program is never flagged here.

Where You'll See the Flag

• The Pending Review list on your dashboard, next to the applicant's name.
• The Students list and the flagged record's profile header.

From the Pending Review list or the profile header, a Review Duplicate button opens the comparison screen. The button only appears if your role can edit students. Read-only roles see the flag but cannot act on it.

Review in Five Steps

1. Choose Review Duplicate from the flagged record. The screen is titled Review a Possible Duplicate.
2. If there is more than one possible match, pick the record you are comparing against from the list at the top. Switching to a different match clears any choices you have made, because a different match is a different question.
3. Read the two summary cards. Kept is the record already on file: it keeps its participant number, program years, and service history. Absorbed is the new application. Each card shows email, phone, date of birth, participant number, created date, and program years, so you can tell the two apart quickly.
4. Resolve the conflicts. The screen lists only the fields where both records have a value and the two values differ. For each one, pick On file or New application. Fields where the records agree are not shown at all. Where the kept record is blank and the application has a value, the value fills in without asking, and you can see the full list under Applied automatically.
5. Choose an outcome: Merge Records or Not a Duplicate. Merge Records stays greyed out until every listed conflict has a choice, and the screen tells you how many are still unanswered. Either button opens a confirmation step: Yes, Merge These Records or Yes, They Are Different People. Nothing is written until you confirm.

If both records hold information for the same program year and their answers differ, a This program year section appears with the same pick-a-side choices. Two answers can conflict this way: Educational Status at Entry and Postsecondary Institution. Education level is exactly the thing that changes between applications, which is often why someone re-applies.

It's Fine to Call the Student

Often the fastest way to settle a conflict is to ask the student which answer is right. The screen is built for exactly that: nothing is saved until you confirm, so you can leave it open while you make the call, come back later, or close the tab without changing a thing.

What a Merge Does

• The kept record stays, with its participant number, program years, and service history intact.
• The new application's contacts, documents, comments, texts, and event attendance move across to the kept record, and so does the submitted application itself. The kept record ends up holding both submissions.
• Any program years the kept record does not already have are added. Years it already has are left as they are, apart from the per-year answers you chose in step 4. The Applied automatically card names the years that will move before you commit.
• The kept record is marked Continuing, since the student has come back to your program. A merge is the only thing that sets this.
• The absorbed record is removed from your roster, and you land on the kept record's profile.
• Before anything changes, a snapshot of both records and of the application's contacts, documents, comments, texts, and event attendance is saved to deleted records. Nothing is destroyed outright, but undoing a merge is not self-service. If you need one reversed, choose Report an Issue in the sidebar or email hello@triopilot.com.

When It's Not a Duplicate

If the two records really are different people, choose Not a Duplicate, then confirm with Yes, They Are Different People. The flag is removed and both records stay exactly as they are. Nothing merges, nothing moves.

Good to Know

• The flag never blocks anything. A flagged record is a complete, working student record. You can log contacts, upload documents, and edit the profile as usual while the flag is up.
• Merging cannot touch staff-entered outcomes. Only the answers an applicant can give about themselves are ever offered as a choice. APR outcome fields, the participant number, the assigned advisor, and tags stay with the kept record, so an application can never overwrite your assessment.
• Someone beat you to it? If another staff member merges or dismisses the pair while your screen is open, your merge is refused with a message asking you to reload and review again. No harm done.
• Every decision is recorded. Merges and dismissals both land in the admin audit log as Merged Duplicate Records and Dismissed a Duplicate Flag, including which side you chose for each field. See See who changed what.