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Sales > Accounts > Managing Accounts > Changing an Account Primary Contact

Changing an Account Primary Contact

An account can have multiple contacts, but one of the contacts must be specified as the primary contact for the account. By default, the first contact added for the account is the primary contact, but you can change this setting.

To change an account primary contact

1. Select the account.

   For instructions on selecting accounts, see Finding Records.

2. On the Account Detail page, click Edit.

   NOTE: If the Primary Contact field is not displayed on the Account Detail and Account Edit page, contact your company administrator to have the field added to your page layout.

   TIP: If the inline edit feature is enabled for your company, you can change the primary contact inline on the Account Detail page. For more information on inline editing, see Updating Record Details.

3. On the Account Edit page, click the Lookup icon on the Primary Contact field.
4. In the Lookup window, select the new primary contact.

   NOTE: Only those contacts that are already linked to the account are available for you to select as the Primary Contact on the account. In addition, if the Account Contact List field appears in the Lookup window, then only the Contact list, which contains the contacts already linked to the account, is available for selection in the Account Contact List field. You cannot select a different list to search for a contact.

5. On the Account Edit page, click Save.

NOTE: In the Contacts related information section of the Account Detail page, the primary contact for the account always appears as the first contact in the list of contacts that are linked to the account, even if the Primary Contact check box is not shown in the Contacts related information section of the Account Detail page. If you click Show Full List to open the full list of linked contacts, then the primary contact might appear as the first record on the list page, even if you sort the list using a field such as Last Name or First Name.

The position of the primary contact in the list depends on how many records are in the list and the number of records that you display on your list page. For example, assume that you have a total of 180 contacts linked to an account, the last name of the primary contact for the account begins with the last letter of the alphabet, and you display 100 records on your list page. In that case, the primary contact appears as the first record in the second page of your list when you sort the list using the Last Name field.