Import Contacts
After reading this, you'll be able to import your contacts into Univents via an Excel template — people and companies in a single file — and know how a repeated import safely updates existing contacts instead of duplicating them.
You can bring your entire contact list into Univents via an Excel file — using a guided wizard right inside Contacts, no support request needed. People and companies live in the same file; Univents links them automatically. The same wizard also works for products and events — see the overview article Import events, products and contacts via Excel for the mechanics that apply to all three.
Starting the import
- Open the Contacts section in the left navigation.
- Click Import in the top right corner.
- The wizard guides you through five steps: Template → Upload → Mapping → Review → Import.
Step 1: Download the template
Click Download template (.xlsx) to get the Excel template. It already has the right column headers, a few example rows, and a Notes sheet listing the allowed values for every column. You don't have to start from scratch — just fill your contacts into the existing rows.
Already have your own list with different columns? That works too — in the next step you'll map your columns to the target fields manually.
Step 2: Upload the file
Drag your Excel or CSV file into the drop zone or pick it via the file dialog. Supported formats are .xlsx, .xls, and .csv, up to 10 MB and up to 5,000 rows per import.
Step 3: Map columns
The wizard detects your column headers automatically and suggests a mapping. Only two fields are actually required:
| Column | Required | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Yes | Person (individual) or Firma (company) |
| Yes | Must be a valid email address | |
| First name / Last name | Conditional | At least one of the two is required for type Person |
| Company name | Conditional | Required for type Firma |
Every other column (salutation, title, position, phone, mobile, fax, website, address, VAT ID, tax number, customer number, external customer number, alternative emails, tags, and more) is optional — the full list with allowed values is in the Notes sheet of your downloaded template.
Linking people to companies
In the Company column, enter the name of the associated company for a person row. Univents looks for an existing company with that name — if none is found, a new company contact is created automatically, so you don't need to prepare companies separately beforehand. Alternatively, you can enter the email address of an existing company here if you don't have the exact name on hand.
Alternative emails and tags
If you enter additional addresses, comma-separated, in the Alternative emails column, Univents saves them as extra email addresses on the contact — they're also taken into account for duplicate matching (see below). Tags in the Tags column (also comma-separated) are created automatically if they don't exist yet and linked to the contact right away.
More fields from the contact form
Since 8 October 2026, every setting you can make in the contact form is also a column in your import file. These are the new ones:
| Area | New columns |
|---|---|
| Address | Domain, Address addition, Region |
| Accounting | Creditor number, Sales tax number, Buyer reference / Leitweg-ID, Default discount (%), Payment terms in days |
| Person and company | Date of birth, Managing directors, Parent company |
| Email and ownership | Invoice email, Order email, Account manager |
A few of them have a quirk worth knowing:
- Domain is the contact's mail domain (e.g.
customer.com). Univents then assigns incoming mail from that domain to the contact automatically. - Region is the state or province of the address.
- Sales tax number is the buyer's VAT number from the Leitweg procedure — not your own VAT ID. Your own number still goes in the VAT ID column.
- Default discount (%) and Payment terms in days are the contact's default terms. Payment terms accept values from 1 to 365 days.
- Managing directors applies to companies and takes several names — separate them with
;, because a name itself can contain a comma. - Invoice email and Order email are additional addresses on the contact. They do not replace the main address from the Email column.
- Account manager expects the email address of a team member of your workspace. The import looks it up in your member list; an unknown address creates nobody, but shows up as a note in the review. Team members are still not created through this import — use Importing team members for that.
- Parent company only applies to rows of type Company: enter the name of an already existing company there (holding → subsidiary). Unlike the Company column for people, the import creates nothing here — an unknown company leaves the row without a parent and shows up as a note in the review.
Step 4 & 5: Review and import
Before anything is saved, the Review step shows you, row by row, whether it will be created, updated, or skipped. Rows with errors don't block the rest of the import — you can download the error list as an Excel file and fix the affected rows separately. Once you confirm the review, the actual Import runs with a progress indicator; at the end you get a report with the number of newly created, updated, and skipped contacts.
Repeating an import safely
Uploading the same file again doesn't create duplicates: Univents first recognizes existing contacts by email address (even if it's only stored as an alternative email) and, if no email matches, falls back to name and type (person/company). On a match, the import only fills in empty fields — existing values are never overwritten. Two different people who share the same name but have different email addresses are correctly treated as two separate contacts.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to create companies in Univents beforehand? No. If you enter a company for a person that doesn't exist yet, the import creates it automatically.
What happens if a row has an error? Only that row is skipped — the rest of the file imports normally. The review step shows you in advance which row is affected and why.
Can duplicate contacts be created? Only if neither the email address nor name and type match an existing contact. Otherwise the import recognizes the contact again and only fills in missing details instead of creating it a second time.
What file format is expected? .xlsx, .xls, or .csv, up to 10 MB and up to 5,000 rows.
Related articles
- Import events, products and contacts via Excel — the wizard overview, including products and events
- Manage contacts & companies — creating contacts manually and fine-tuning the relationship between people and companies