How to Manage Customers with changing Email Addresses

[StarCircleAcademy]

I’m really asking the question rather than saying HOW to accomplish the task. There are several inter-related issues here and I’m curious how others manage this problem.

Joe Customer (Joe@old.example.com) purchases several products. A month or so later Joe changes his email address to [Joe@new.example.com]. What if anything should be done with the existing records?

Problems:

A. If using an autoresponder, old joe is registered in the mailing list.

B. If an update or upgrade is desired it will need to be sent to New joe.

C. If a full or partial refund is needed – not clear what to do there if using, say PayPal.

Here are some ways I’ve thought to address this issue.

1. Update all references in the customer table from [Joe@old.example.com] to [Joe@new.example.com] (there is no eStore way to do this currently, but it’s easy to do in PhpMyAdmin)

2. Duplicate old joe customer records to newer joe (no eStore way to do this automatically and not so easy in PhpMyAdmin) and mark the old ones as obsolete.

3. Don’t worry about it.

Since I publish digital software that gets upgraded every so often I often get people saying “my email address has changed to…” and I don’t have a crisp way to handle this. Part of me wants to scream: dudes – get yourself your own domain.

CORROLARY:

Some of my customers have used different email addresses for different purchases (and they often, like me, can’t keep them straight).

[wzp]

It’s really a “management policy” issue, and not something the technology can easily solve automagically.

Remember, updates/upgrades that use the “resend link” shortcode depend upon the customer tables. Do you even have a management policy in place regarding records retention?

What level of fallibility do you give your MySQL database? At Tips & Tricks HQ, we primarily depend on the customer to keep track of their Transaction ID as proof-of-purchase. As long as your customers can provide adequate proof-of-purchase, you can take whatever “reactive steps,” manual or otherwise; as necessary.

Because the issues you describe are “exceptions,” to the normal business process, as long as customers can provide proof-of-purchase, and as long as the frequency of these exceptions is minimal; manual remedies are acceptable.

[admin]

In eStore’s manage customer interface, you can easily copy the old record and then update the email address and insert a new record. The following post has explanation on how to do that:

http://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/ecommerce/copy-customer-details-to-create-a-new-record-3110

[Author]

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