What is the best way to organize/track a user who may reach out us using identifying information we don't have stored?

Question

Our income Account is linked with our customer built user tracking program and when a customer reaches out to us using contact info we have on file it will group all that information into a single thread. However if that customer calls or emails us using contact info NOT on file it starts a new thread. I have two specific questions. 1) Is there a proactive way that we could automatically catch that the same person has reached out on different email. maybe a way to track the IP address of the computer they are using. 2) in cases where someone reached out using a different phone number can we attach or combine two different threads? As a customer service team it is getting confusing when we have to track the same issue over multiple different threads.

Oseas · Answer

Hey @brian f13​! Oséas here from the Customer Support Specialist team &#128373;️1) Unfortunately, is not possible to identify users based on IP address. Here's how Intercom identifies users based on the data you send:When you send a user with an email address only, we match on the emailWhen you send us a user_id only we match on user_idWhen you send us both an email address and a user_id, we match on user_id.If no user is found based on the user_id sent, we will match on email. If a user is found with that email but no user_id, we will update that user and add the user_id to them. If a user is found with that email but with a different user_id, we will create a new user with that user_id and email.The value you send for user_id should be:the primary key from the user record in your databaseit should be a unique value for each userIt shouldn't have any other meaning other than identifying your user2) The same applies to your second question. The primary key used to identify the user will be the user ID or email address, and not the phone number.

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