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Dynamics 365 Community / Forums / Small and medium business | Business Central, N... / How can I import exist...
Small and medium business | Business Central, N...
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How can I import existing contacts to a lookup field in a custom entity

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Posted on by PeterMode 10

I am using Dynamics Online and have created two new entities to handle our event registration. I have created a lookup field linked to contacts which works if i manually search for contacts in the field using their email address. However, when I import the contact email address the system cannot recognise the query. 

Is there a work around for this?

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Dynamics 365 Business Central
I have the same question (0)
  • Community Member Profile Picture
    Community Member on at

    In order to import lookup fields you need to render the CSV source attribute in the following format:

            " [ Related Entity Type Name ] , [ Related Entity Instance GUID ] "

    For example

            "account,{BB51BC3D-98EB-DC11-9C73-0002B3C73EB0}"

    Here is a complete contacts.csv example

    FirstName,LastName,ParentCustomer

    Adi,Katz,"account,{BB51BC3D-98EB-DC11-9C73-0002B3C73EB0}"

    Notice the " " wrapping the lookup value. This is because a comma (,) is used to separate the Related Entity type and value.

  • PeterMode Profile Picture
    PeterMode 10 on at

    Hi Lewis

    Thanks for the feedback. I have tried putting in the following into the contact field. 

    This is a test first name, last name, account

    AMBATest1,AMBATest1,"Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Indonesia"

    I was not able to find the account number like what you have listed above..  {BB51BC3D-98EB-DC11-9C73-0002B3C73EB0}" is this something I will need to generate on each contact or account? or is there away I can find this? I have looked in the customisation settings and cannot find a ParentCustomer field. 

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