---
title: Phone, email and messengers of a contact
summary: Phone numbers, email and messenger handles of a card; which of them are confirmed and which one is main, where reminders go.
tools: [talemo_add_contact_point, talemo_remove_contact_point, talemo_set_primary_contact, talemo_get_contact]
related: [contact-card, reminders-opt-out, contact-history]
search: [phone number, email, WhatsApp number, Instagram handle]
---

# Contacts of a card

A card can have several addresses: phone numbers, email, WhatsApp, Instagram
and Telegram.

## Phone numbers

A number that starts with `+` or `00` gets its country from the prefix. A
number without one needs a country chosen from the list, otherwise it is
refused. The branch's time zone never decides the country. Talemo keeps the
number in international format together with its country and shows it the way
that country writes numbers. An Instagram handle is kept in lowercase without
`@`; Telegram takes a username or a number.

## One address, one card

An address can belong to only one card in a business. Adding an address that is
already on another card is refused, and the refusal does not say whose card it
is: for a person who sees only own cards that would be a leak. The web app looks
the other card up by the digits and offers to open it. Adding an address the
card already has just returns it.

## Confirmed addresses

An address is confirmed only when the client writes from it: a WhatsApp number
or an Instagram handle that sent a message to the business. Staff cannot
confirm an address by hand, and an exported Instagram chat history does not
confirm it either. The card shows each address as confirmed (with the date the
client first wrote from it) or not confirmed yet.

## The main contact

Visit confirmations and reminders go to the main contact. Only a confirmed
address can be main, so the message surely reaches the client.

- The first address that gets confirmed becomes main if the card has none.
- If the client wrote from two places, the first stays main; a person can
  switch it in **Where should reminders go?** on the card.
- If the main address is removed, the confirmed address the client wrote from
  most recently becomes main.

## Tools and refusals

- `talemo_add_contact_point` takes `party_id`, `channel` (phone, email, WhatsApp, Telegram or Instagram) and `address`. A phone, WhatsApp or Telegram number without `+` and without `00` needs `country`, an ISO 3166-1 code like `RU` or `DE`. When you do not know it, ask the person: the time zone of the branch does not tell, and +7 is both Russia and Kazakhstan. Without it the call is refused with `contact.country_required`.
- A way to reach that already belongs to another contact of the business is refused with status 409, code `contact.taken`: find that contact with `talemo_find_contacts` by the digits. One the contact already has is returned as it is.
- `talemo_remove_contact_point` removes one, and the history of the contact keeps a line that it was removed.
- `talemo_get_contact` shows each way with `primary` and `confirmed_at`. A WhatsApp or Instagram way is confirmed when the client writes from it, and staff cannot confirm it by hand. The first confirmed one becomes the main one, where the reminders about a visit go.
- `talemo_set_primary_contact` moves the main one to another way, and only a confirmed way can be main: an unconfirmed one is refused with status 409, code `contact.unconfirmed`.