Effi's CRM has introduced a new way of organising the people and households behind every deal: Contacts and Accounts. Leads work exactly as they did before — this update simply adds a proper home for personal details and joint applications, so information only needs to be entered once.

Why we made this change

Previously, every deal was stored as a standalone record. If the same client came back for a second or third loan, brokers often had to search, or simply retype, their details each time. That created duplicate records for the same person — which caused real problems downstream:

Clients receiving the same SMS, email or birthday message two or three times, once for each duplicate record.
Integrations like ActiveCampaign, MessageMedia and call-matching tools not recognising a returning client, because their information was split across multiple records.
Extra data-entry time for brokers re-entering details for people already in the system.

Contacts and Accounts fix this at the source: each person now has a single, unique record, and everything about that person — and the people they're applying with — stays in one place.

Three building blocks: Contact, Account, Lead

It helps to think of the new structure as three connected layers. Leads aren't going anywhere — Contacts and Accounts simply sit underneath them.

Layer	What it represents
Contact	One individual person. Holds their personal identity information: name, phone, email, employment, income, address, driver licence and passport details. Every person has exactly one contact record, no matter how many deals they have.
Account	A household or applicant group — the people applying or buying together. This is where shared financial information lives, including the fact find and household expenses, because those figures apply to the group, not one person alone.
Lead	An individual deal: a home loan, car loan, or other application. This is the object you already know — it still syncs to aggregator systems like Salestrekker exactly as before.

A contact can be linked to more than one account, and an account can be linked to more than one lead. For example, two applicants buying three properties together are still just two contacts and one account — but three separate leads.

Worked example: a joint application

Sarah and Michael come in together for a home loan. Here's how that looks in Effi:

Sarah has her own Contact record — her personal details, ID and employment history.
Michael has his own Contact record, separate from Sarah's.
Because they're applying together, they also share one Account, which holds their combined fact find and household expenses.
Their home loan is a Lead, linked to that shared Account.

Now suppose Sarah later decides to buy an investment property with her sister Priya instead of Michael. That's a different household with different combined expenses — so it becomes a second, separate Account. Sarah's own Contact record doesn't change or duplicate; it's simply linked to a second Account as well.

Example fact find for a joint application — each applicant has their own detail sections, held together at the account level.

The rule of thumb

If a detail is true about one person no matter who they apply with (ID, income, phone number) — it lives on the Contact.

If a detail depends on who they're applying with (combined household expenses, joint fact find) — it lives on the Account.

How this changes your day-to-day workflow

The main change you'll notice is a search-first step whenever you add a new lead. Instead of typing a client's details from scratch every time, you'll be asked to find them first.

Start adding a new lead, as usual.
Search by the person's name, phone number or email before entering any details.
If they already exist, select them — their contact details are already correct and locked in, so there's nothing left to retype.
If they're new, create a contact in a couple of extra clicks. This becomes their one and only record going forward, ready to reuse next time they come back.

Searching for an existing contact before creating a new lead — an exact match is found and locked in automatically.

No match found? Create a new contact in a few clicks — the extra step now saves rework later.

It's a small extra click for brand-new clients, but it removes retyping altogether for every repeat client — and it's the step that keeps everyone's records clean.

Finding Contacts and Accounts

Contacts and Accounts have their own place in the main left-hand navigation — not tucked away in settings — so you can look someone up the moment a client calls, the same way you would in tools like HubSpot or Salesforce.

Contacts and Accounts are available directly from the main navigation, with live record counts.

Opening a contact shows every account and lead linked to that person, so you can jump straight into any of them.

From a contact's page you can see their linked accounts and leads at a glance — handy for answering questions like “how many deals does this person have?” or “what stage is their application at?” without leaving the record.

What happened to your existing data

Nothing has been lost. Every existing lead has already been migrated into a contact automatically. For some clients, an account has already been created too; for others, one will be created the first time a joint fact find is needed. You may see this rolling out gradually across different parts of Effi as the update continues to deploy.

Existing integrations and API-based lead creation are unaffected. If a lead is added through an existing integration, Effi will now check for a matching contact using the person's email and phone number, and attach the lead to that existing record automatically instead of creating a duplicate.

Deleting or updating a contact

You can delete a contact, but only when it's safe to do so. If a contact is linked to an active lead, Effi won't allow it to be deleted directly — it must be unlinked first. This protects compliance history, since lead records often need to be retained even if a client asks for their personal details to be removed.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to change how I add a new lead?

Barely. You'll be asked to search for the person first. For an existing client, that search finds them instantly. For a new client, it's one extra click to create their contact, then everything continues as normal.

What if a client applies with someone new?

A new account is created for that specific combination of applicants. Each person's individual contact record stays exactly as it was — it's simply linked to the new account as well.

Will I lose any historical data?

No. Existing leads were migrated into contacts automatically, and nothing has been deleted or overwritten.

Why can't I delete a contact straight away?

If it's linked to an active lead, it needs to be unlinked first. This is a safeguard to protect compliance records — not a bug.

Need a hand?

If something doesn't look right, or a contact or account isn't linking the way you'd expect, reach out to the Effi support team and we'll take a look.

Understanding Contacts and Accounts