Protecting contact data (GDPR)

The CRM keeps personal data about people outside your company: the people you deal with at customers, prospects and partners, members and the people who register for your events. This article explains how to record and lift an objection, set how long contacts are kept, export a contact’s data and erase it, and what happens to the CRM traces of an employee whose data is erased. It is intended for CRM administrators and the people in charge of data protection; the part on objections also concerns sales representatives.

Before you start #

• The CRM module must be enabled for your workspace and open to you (see Enabling and administering the CRM module).
• Recording an objection requires “CRM contacts — Edit”, that is, the permission to edit the contact.
• The other actions belong to the GDPR section of the CRM menu in the role matrix: “CRM contact data protection — View” to open the retention page and to export a contact’s data; “CRM contact data protection — Edit” to set retention periods and lift an objection; “CRM contact data protection — Delete” to erase a contact. The Access level is enough.
• Each permission applies within a scope, Mine, My team or All, based on the contact’s owner: this is the GDPR row of a role’s CRM scopes card (see CRM settings).
• By default, only the Administrator role holds the data protection permissions, with the All scope. The Sales representative and Sales manager roles can record an objection on the contacts they edit.

What the CRM keeps about a contact #

For each contact, the CRM keeps their record (identity, contact details, preferences, legal basis and consent, see Managing contacts), their attachments to accounts, the activities and opportunities they appear in, the quotes addressed to them, the emails logged with them, their memberships and their event registrations. The actions below answer the rights that the GDPR and the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP) give these people: objection, access, portability and erasure.

They are on the contact’s record, in the Preferences and data protection section: the Stop contacting, Export their data and Erase this contact buttons only appear with the matching permission.

Recording an objection #

When a contact asks not to be contacted any more:

1. Open their record and click Stop contacting.
2. In the Stop contacting this person? window, enter a Reason (optional) if you wish, 255 characters at most.
3. Click Stop contacting. The message says how many calls and emails still to do were closed, and from how many the contact was removed.

The objection takes effect immediately:

• a banner at the top of the record says so: “This contact no longer wishes to be contacted”, with the date, the person who recorded it and the reason;
• all three channels are refused and the preferred channel is removed: the Do not email, Do not call and No mail badges appear wherever the contact is shown;
• scheduling a call with them is refused (“This contact does not want to be called.”), as is sending them a quote by email; an incoming call or a logged email can still be recorded;
• calls and emails still to do that target only them are closed, with the outcome “Cancelled”; from those that also target other contacts, they are simply removed.

The objection lasts. It survives a merge of two contacts: the oldest one is kept (see Finding duplicates and merging records). An import never lifts a refusal (see Importing, exporting and using the API). A contact who is given the email address of a contact under objection, at creation (even with Create anyway), through an import or through an address added later, also goes under objection.

Lifting an objection #

Only someone who holds “CRM contact data protection — Edit” can lift an objection, for example when the contact agrees again to be contacted.

1. In the record’s objection banner, click Lift the objection.
2. In the Lift the objection? window, enter the Reason for lifting: it is mandatory and goes into the contact’s log.
3. Click Lift the objection. The message “Objection lifted. The channels stay closed: reopen them by editing the contact.” confirms it.

Lifting the objection reopens no channel: all three remain refused. To reopen one, then edit the contact’s Contact preferences. As long as the objection has not been lifted, unticking a refused channel is refused: “This contact is in opposition: lift the opposition before reopening a channel.”

Setting how long contacts are kept #

Open Settings › CRM › Data protection. Illizeo sets no retention period by default: no law sets one for a prospect, so it is your decision. As long as a period is not set, nothing in its category is purged.

Under Contact retention, each contact falls into one of these categories, counted from the date in the From column:

Category	Who is in it	From
Prospect without activity	Contacts attached to an account, without being customers	Last activity (otherwise, contact creation)
Customer contact	Contacts attached to a Customer-type account, or who appear in a won deal	Last deal (won opportunity, accepted quote)
Contact detached from any account	Contacts with no current attachment	End of the last link (otherwise, contact creation)
Event registrant, never matched	Registrations received through an event’s public form and never matched to a contact (see Events and public registrations)	End of the event

1. For each category, enter a period from 1 to 1,200 and its unit, months or years, or leave it empty.
2. Under Quote retention, enter a period in years for each issuing company (see below), or leave it empty.
3. Click Save. The message “Retention periods saved.” confirms it, and every change is written to the log.

Give both the period and its unit, or neither. A contact is never purged while they appear in an open opportunity or while a current quote is addressed to them (draft, awaiting approval or sent). The screen reminds you: “Shortening a period purges nothing straight away: what exceeds it is announced, and goes only 30 days later.”

Quotes of an erased contact #

When a contact is erased, their sent quotes stay as issued. The Quote retention period, in years, decides when to delete them: one per issuing company (the main company and each sub-company), counted from when the quote was sent. If left empty, these quotes are kept.

The nightly purge and its notices #

Every night, after the backup, Illizeo reviews the retention periods:

1. It announces what will expire within thirty days. The people who hold “CRM contact data protection — Edit” receive a notice, in the bell and by email: the number of contacts and quotes concerned and the purge date, never a name.
2. It purges what has expired and was announced at least thirty days earlier: the contact is erased (see below), and the quote of an erased contact is deleted with its lines and PDF. A second notice says what was purged.
3. It records a report of the run.

Nothing is therefore removed without being announced thirty days earlier. An announcement that is no longer justified is withdrawn, for example if you extend the period, if the contact has a new activity or if an opportunity is reopened.

The Data protection page also shows:

• Coming up: the Contacts announced, the Quotes announced and the date of the Next purge, or “No purge is announced.”;
• Purge history: for each run, its Date, the number of Contacts erased, Quotes deleted and items Announced, with the breakdown By category. Numbers only: a purge keeps nobody’s name.

The texts of the two emails can be customised in Settings › Manage Illizeo › Email: “CRM — upcoming retention purge (30 days ahead, to whoever sets data protection)” and “CRM — retention purge done (to whoever sets data protection)”.

Exporting a contact’s data #

To answer an access or portability request, click Export their data on the contact’s record (“CRM contact data protection — View”). You get a JSON file that contains:

• their record: identity, contact details, preferences, legal basis and consent, objection, owner, tags and custom fields;
• their attachments to accounts, with role, job title and dates;
• the activities they appear in, private ones included, with their report;
• the opportunities they appear in, with their role;
• the quotes addressed to them, with their lines.

The file says nothing about the other contacts of an activity or an opportunity, but a report is exported as it was written: read it before you send the file. Every export is written to the log.

Erasing a contact #

To answer an erasure request:

1. On the contact’s record, click Erase this contact (“CRM contact data protection — Delete”).
2. The Erase …? window shows, in figures, What goes (Email addresses, Phone numbers, Account attachments, Emails logged with this contact) and What stays (Activities, Opportunities, Issued quotes, Quotes never issued), and flags a contact under objection.
3. Tick I understand that this erasure is final., then click Erase permanently. The message “Contact erased.” confirms it.

What goes: their contact details (emails, phone numbers, LinkedIn), notes, title, job title, tags, custom fields, attachments, preferences and legal basis, the trace of a merge in which theirs was the record kept, their copy on projects and their place in multi-organisation projects. Their calls and emails still to do are closed. An email logged with them alone is deleted; from an email that involves other contacts, they are removed.

What stays:

• in the activities and opportunities where they appeared, they are shown as “Erased contact”, without a link; the content of those belongs to the account;
• their sent quotes stay as issued, PDF and lines, but are no longer linked to them; they can be read with the quote permissions alone, until the end of the period set for their issuing company. Their quotes never sent remain drafts of the account, without a contact;
• their memberships keep their dues (numbers and amounts) and their event registrations are still counted, without naming them any more;
• the log records the erasure and figures, never a contact detail.

An erased contact disappears from lists, searches and records; nothing reopens them. If they were under objection, Illizeo keeps an irreversible fingerprint of their email addresses, with no name and no readable address: if the same address comes back (import, manual entry), the new contact is born under objection. Erasing differs from deleting a contact (see Managing contacts): deletion removes the contact from the activities and opportunities they appeared in, while erasure leaves an anonymous trace there.

An employee’s CRM traces #

The export of an employee’s data includes a CRM part: their activities (written, assigned or taken part in; title, type, dates and account, never the report), the accounts, opportunities and quotes they own, the number of their contacts (without their names) and their sales targets.

When an employee’s data is erased, they are no longer named as the author of their actions in the CRM, but what they wrote remains: activities, reports, accounts, contacts, opportunities and quotes belong to the company and its customers. Their participation in activities and their sales targets are deleted. The records they owned stay linked to their anonymised record, or are left without an owner if their data is erased completely. To reassign a leaver’s portfolio in good time, see The CRM and HR: time, expenses, absences and departures.

Good to know #

• The CRM declares a “Business relationships (CRM)” processing activity in the workspace’s record of processing: its purposes, the data kept, each contact’s legal basis and the periods you have set. A period that is not set is shown as such.
• An erased contact can no longer be exported or erased a second time: they no longer exist for these actions.
• The contact of a project linked to the CRM follows the CRM’s retention, not that of projects (see From a won deal to a project).

FAQ #

What is the difference between a refused channel and an objection? #

A refused channel (Do not call, for example) is ticked and unticked in the contact’s preferences by anyone who can edit them. An objection closes all three channels at once, closes the calls and emails still to do, and only someone in charge of data protection can lift it, giving a reason.

A contact’s retention period has passed, but they have not been purged. #

Check that the period of their category is set, that they do not appear in an open opportunity or a current quote, and that the announcement is at least thirty days old: the purge always follows an announcement made thirty days earlier. The Coming up section shows what is announced.