Person Fields

The person fields contain information related to the person associated with an account, such as first name, last name, language preference, and key contact information.

Notes:

Although the fields below are described separately from the other fields in the Main Account Data File, they must be included in the same file as the other fields, with all columns included in every row. See Account Data File Specifications for more information.
Oracle Utilities Opower supports up to three phone numbers and email addresses per account. In such cases, each field should have a suffix of _1, _2, and _3 to differentiate them. See Phone Number Examples and Email Address Examples below for details.
Empty values in fields or missing fields will be interpreted as deletions, and previously-received data for those fields will be removed. See Empty Values and Deletions below for details.

Field	Description
person_id	A unique identifier for a person in a utility's Customer Information System or other system of record. Type: VARCHAR(40) Can Be Empty?: No. Primary Key.
person_type	A flag to indicate whether the person is a business or not. Allowed Values: Person Business Type: ENUM Can Be Empty?: No.
first_name	The customer's first name. If `person_type` = `person`, then at least one of `first_name` and `last_name` must be specified. If `person_type` = `Business`, then `first_name` and `last_name` are optional if a `business_name` is provided. Type: VARCHAR(408) Can Be Empty?: Yes. Business Key.
last_name	The customer's last name. If `person_type` = `person`, then at least one of `first_name` and `last_name` must be specified. If `person_type` = `Business`, then `first_name` and `last_name` are optional if a `business_name` is provided. Type: VARCHAR(408) Can Be Empty?: Yes. Business Key.
business_name	The name of the business. If `person_type` = `Business`, this should be populated. If `person_type` = `PERSON`, this can be empty. Type: VARCHAR(408) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
language_preference	A country and language code combination. For a full list of country codes, see Wikipedia - Officially Assigned Code Elements. For a full list of language codes, see Wikipedia - List of ISO 639-1 Codes. The full language code is a combination of the ISO 639-1 two-character language code and the ISO 3166-1 two-character country code. Example Value: en_US Type: VARCHAR(5) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
is_main_customer	A flag to indicate whether the person is the primary customer for the account. See Example Data: Switching the Main Customer on the Account below for instructions on how to change who is the main customer. Note: Only one person can be the primary customer of an account at any one time. Oracle Utilities Opower communicates with the primary account holder for many types of communications. Allowed Values: Y This person is the primary customer. N This person is not the primary customer. Type: BOOLEAN. See Supported Boolean Formats for more information. Can Be Empty?: No.
bill_route_type	The method used to transmit the bill to the customer. Example Values: EBILL Route the bill by email. POSTAL Route the bill by postal service. Type: VARCHAR(8) Can Be Empty?: No.
person_updated_at	The date at which the record was updated in the source system. If left blank, the field does not store any data. Type: DATETIME. See Date and Time Handling for details. Can Be Empty?: Yes.
phone_type_X	The type of phone number, such as Home or Mobile. Up to three sets of phone number columns are allowed for a customer. If one row includes two or more sets of phone number columns, then every other record in the file must also have two or more sets of phone number columns even if many of the columns are left empty. See Phone Number Examples below for details. Type: VARCHAR(45) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
phone_number_X	The customer's number in one of the following formats: (999) 999-9999 or 999 999 9999. International phone number formats are supported using the E.164 standard. Up to three sets of phone number columns are allowed for a customer. See Phone Number Examples below for details. Type: VARCHAR(20) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
phone_extension_X	The extension of the phone number. Type: VARCHAR(45) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
email_address_X	The customer's email address. Up to three emails may be provided. If one row includes two or more sets of email columns, then every other record in the file must also have two or more sets of email columns even if many of the columns are left empty. See Email Address Examples below for more information. Type: VARCHAR(344) Can Be Empty?: Yes.
email_type_X	The type of email address, such as for personal or work-related use. Up to three emails may be provided. See Email Address Examples below for more information. Type: VARCHAR(45) Can Be Empty?: Yes.

Example Data: Switching the Main Customer on the Account

To switch the main account customer, supply two rows in the input file. One row must mark the current main account customer as not the main account customer in the is_main_customer field. Another row must identify the new main account customer in the same field.

For example, the original data file would have this data:

person_id	<other fields>	is_main_customer	account_id
1234	...	Y	9012
5678	...	N	9012

Then the second iterative data file would have the data below. The only change is that the is_main_customer field was updated to mark one customer as the main person and the other as not.

person_id	<other fields>	is_main_customer	account_id
1234	...	N	9012
5678	...	Y	9012

Phone Number Examples

Up to three phone numbers may be provided for a single account. In the example below, one customer account has three phone numbers, another has two phone numbers, another has only one phone number, and another has no phone numbers at all. Note that despite these differences, each row has three "sets" of phone number columns even though many columns are empty. In other words, even if one customer has three phone numbers while another does not, there must still be three sets of phone number columns in every row of the data file.

Image showing phone number examples.

Email Address Examples

Up to three email addresses may be provided for a single account. In the example below, one customer account has three email addresses, another has two addresses, another has only one address, and another has no address at all. Note that despite these differences, each row has three "sets" of email address columns even though many columns are empty. In other words, even if one customer has three email addresses while another does not, there must still be three sets of email address columns in every row of the data file.

Image showing example data for customer email addresses.

Empty Values and Deletions

Empty values in fields or missing fields will be interpreted as deletions, and previously-received data for those fields will be removed. For example, if a previous file had a phone_number_3 field filled in, and a subsequent file is missing the field or transmits it with an empty number, the phone_number_3 field value will be deleted from the Oracle Utilities Opower operational data store. The same principle applies for any email_address_x fields.