Hi All,

I am trying to append 3 different company's customer tables together to make one main mailing database.

I am ok appending the 3 all into one table which Ive called "tblMain"

tblMain now has some duplicates and I want to make sure we only mail once to each customer. I am finding duplicates based on the PostCode field. The "find duplicates" query finds the duplicates but what I want to do is:

Find any customers that appear twice or three times. Then delete the records so that they only appear once in the main tblMain.

Can anyone help?

Thanks
Simon

do it manually
unless you can dream up some method of validating which is 'the' best row to keep.
use your query to identify which rows have duplicates.
then display those rows in a form / report whatever
then manually go though the list to delete, so that would probably mean best to display on a form.

there's various identifiers that might make a row a duplicate
..its could be a typo in one or more columns eg Smith's & Co, Simths, Smths & Co, J Smith & Co
you may have the same company but a different address say a different branch
you may have more than one contact at the same address eg compnay A dealt with Fred Bloggs, compnay B dealt with Jane Doe and company C dealt with Ouja M'Callit.

so possible mathcign criteria are similar top leve domain
ie match on @smiths.co.uk
match on postcode
use some form of phonics string comparison such as double metaphone

deciding what is the best approach is tricky, especially for what is often a one off process.

Thanks. You are correct that the same company can appear typed 3 different ways. This is why i have tried to use the post code to compare. When I list the duplicates, it gives me a list of 900. I was hoping I could delete/keep one without going through them manually. Thanks anyway