KDesk Contact Management

Contacts are the people your team supports in KDesk. A contact record stores identity and directory details, a Primary Email used for portal authentication, labeled notification emails and phones, address information, notification preferences, portal permissions, and directory/sync metadata. Contacts can be linked to tickets, receive ticket updates by email, be assigned forms, and (when your workspace allows it) sign in to the portal with a one-time code or Microsoft/Google single sign-on.

How to Access Contacts

In the KDesk App, open the left sidebar and select Contacts. If you can view contacts but cannot create or edit them, your account is missing the member permission Modify contacts. Bulk CSV import is controlled separately: you also need Import contacts (bulk), and your team must enable Allow bulk contact import in Team Settings > Communication.

Creating a Contact

To create a new contact, open Contacts and select Create contact. KDesk opens the contact editor with sections on the left. You can save a record with minimal information, then refine it later, but Primary Email is strongly recommended when the contact may use the portal because it is the email KDesk uses for portal sign-in codes and team-portal lookup.

Searching, Sorting, and Bulk Selection

The Contacts Directory supports search by name, company, Primary Email, labeled emails, and phones. You can also filter by Active/Inactive status, sort the main columns, page through results, and select filtered rows for bulk actions.

Viewing, Editing, and Deleting Contacts

Each contact row has an actions menu. Choose View to open the record in read-only mode, Edit to update it, or Delete to permanently remove it. KDesk also supports bulk deletion from the Contacts table using selection checkboxes. If you need a backup before deleting, export contacts first.

Importing Contacts (Bulk CSV)

If bulk import is enabled for your workspace, select Import contacts from the Contacts page. KDesk lets you download a CSV template, upload a CSV file, and review an import summary showing created and failed rows.

The current import template supports core contact fields such as firstName, lastName, primaryEmail, emails, phones, company, job, address fields, division, contactIsActive, and notes. The primaryEmail column is used for portal authentication. Email and phone values can be imported as a single value, a list, or a labeled JSON map.

Contact Sections (What Each Section Stores)

Section	What it’s for	Examples of fields
Information	Core profile details, authentication email, and internal notes used by your team.	First name, last name, Primary Email, company, job title, division, notes
Contact Info	Structured communication methods stored as labeled values.	Emails (work, personal), phones (mobile, work)
Address	Client-facing location details for shipping, on-site visits, and record keeping.	Street address, address line 2, city, state/province, postal/ZIP, country
Notifications	Per-contact preferences controlling which messages KDesk may send.	Email new tickets, email ticket updates, email new comments, email form assignments
Permissions	Whether the contact is active and what they can do in the portal.	Active contact, portal access, can post comments, can close tickets
Directory / Sync	Organizational relationship fields plus directory-sync metadata.	Reports to contact ID, reports to sync ID, Directory sync ID, Directory organization ID

Primary Email, Emails, and Phones

Primary Email is separate from the labeled records stored under Emails. KDesk uses Primary Email for portal lookup and one-time login codes. The labeled Emails and Phones fields are used to store additional communication records and are searchable from the Contacts directory.

Primary Email: jane.doe@acme.com
Emails: billing: invoices@acme.com personal: jane@gmail.com
Phones: mobile: +1-555-123-4567 work: +1-555-987-6543

Notifications (What They Control)

Contact notification toggles are used by KDesk when deciding whether a contact should receive a given message type. These preferences work alongside your team’s Communication settings, so a notification is sent only when both the workspace rule and the contact’s own preference allow it.

Notification setting	What it means
Email new tickets	Sends an email when a new ticket is created for or associated with this contact.
Email ticket updates	Sends an email when the ticket changes (status updates, assignments, and similar changes).
Email new comments	Sends an email when a new comment is posted on the ticket.
Email form assignments	Sends an email when a form is assigned to this contact.

Portal Permissions (Contact-Level Controls)

Portal access is controlled at both the team level and the contact level. The contact-level fields below decide what an individual contact can do once the team has enabled the matching workspace capability.

Permission	What it does
Active contact	Marks the contact as active or inactive in your workspace directory workflows.
Portal access	Allows the contact to sign in to the contact portal when the team portal is enabled.
Can post comments	Allows the contact to post comments in the portal when the team also allows portal commenting.
Can close tickets	Allows the contact to close tickets in the portal when the team also allows contact ticket closing.

Portal and Communication Settings (Team-Level Controls)

Team Settings > Communication contains the workspace-wide rules that govern contact portal behavior. Contact capabilities only work when both the team setting and the contact’s own permission allow the action.

Team setting	What it controls
Contacts can access the web portal	Enables the contact portal for the workspace.
Contacts can use single sign-on	Shows Microsoft and Google sign-in options on the contact portal.
Require synced contact match for SSO	Only allows contact SSO when the login matches the synced directory identity for that contact.
Contacts can post comments	Allows portal commenting for contacts who also have Can post comments.
Allow comments on closed tickets	Allows comments to continue on closed tickets when commenting is otherwise permitted.
Contacts can close tickets	Allows portal ticket closing for contacts who also have Can close tickets.
Allow bulk contact import	Shows the bulk CSV import workflow on the Contacts page for members with import permission.

Portal Links and Sign-In Experience

KDesk supports two portal entry flows: a team portal link and a contact-specific portal link. On the Contacts page, Get Contact Portal copies the team portal entry link for broad sharing, while Copy portal link from a contact’s actions menu copies a link that is already tied to a specific contact record.

The team portal link prompts for the contact’s Primary Email, while a contact-specific link skips that lookup step because it is already tied to a record. In the code-based flow, KDesk sends a one-time 7-character code to the contact’s Primary Email. When contact SSO is enabled for the workspace, the portal can also show Microsoft and Google sign-in options. On supported browsers and devices, the contact portal can also be installed as its own app experience.

How Contacts Integrate with Tickets and Forms

Contacts are loaded alongside tickets in the KDesk App so agents can associate people with a ticket and reference their details while working the issue. Ticket views can show Ticket contacts, and contact information is used to determine who is participating in a ticket, who should receive notifications, and who may view or interact with tickets through the portal.

When your team uses contact request templates, those templates can prefill default values, lock specific fields, limit availability to specific contacts or email domains, and optionally let contacts choose assignees or add other contacts when submitting a request.

Forms can also be assigned directly to contacts. To receive a form assignment, the contact must be active, have Portal access enabled, and belong to a team where the contact portal is enabled.

Integrate with Directory Sync

KDesk can populate and maintain contacts through multiple inbound directory connections for the same team. Depending on your configuration, you can pull contacts from Google Workspace, Microsoft Entra, and LDAP. These connections pull data into KDesk; they do not push changes back to the source directory.

Sync mappings can populate fields such as Primary Email, company, job title, division, address fields, notes, reports-to values, portal permissions, and notification preferences. Directory sync ID and Directory organization ID are contact fields on the record and are commonly populated by inbound sync, while Reports to contact ID and Reports to sync ID can be used to represent organizational relationships in KDesk.

If your team requires a synced contact match for SSO, contact single sign-on is only allowed when the SSO identity matches the synced directory identity for that contact. There is a more in-depth guide here.

Exporting Contacts

The Contacts page includes Export contacts, which downloads a CSV of the current directory. If you have selected contacts, the export includes only those selected records; otherwise, it exports the full directory.

The export includes core profile fields, Primary Email, labeled emails and phones, address data, division and job title, portal permissions (including Can close tickets), notification preferences, reports-to values, notes, and directory metadata.