Contacts are people from your customer base who may request technical support from you. Each contact can have multiple email addresses associated with them, allowing tickets and communication from any of these addresses to be linked to the same contact. For each customer, you can designate a main contact person. Contacts can interact interact with you via phone, email, the Customer Portal, WhatsApp, Teams, or by generating a ticket using the CTRL + F12 hotkey from their workstations.

Manually create contacts

You can create a new contact manually when a customer reaches out for the first time and isn’t yet in your system. You can also open a ticket while adding the contact, and they’ll receive automatic email notifications as it’s updated.

To create a new contact manually:

1. Click New > Contact in the menu bar (top of screen).

The New Contact page appears.

2. Fill out the form:

• Customer: Select the customer.
• Name: Enter the contact's name.
• Email: Enter the contact's email. 
  • Additional email addresses can be assigned to the contact once created.
• Phone: Enter the contact's phone number.
• Mobile phone: Enter the contact's mobile phone number.
• Department: Select the relevant department from the dropdown list. Learn more
• Job title: Enter the contact's job title.
• Related devices: Assign a primary agent to the contact. Learn more
• Permissions:
  • Main site user: You can designate the contact as the main customer contact. They'll then be able to see all tickets under their customer in the Customer Portal.
  • Disable automatic ticket creation on emails from the user: By default, Atera automatically creates tickets when contacts send emails to the support address. Check the box to disable this feature for the particular contact.

3. Click Create.

The new contact is added. and appears within the Customer > Contacts page.

Automatically create contacts

Automatically create a new contact when a ticket is received from an unrecognized email address. Configure your email settings, including support addresses and forwarding, to control how contacts are created. Learn more

To automatically create contacts:

1. Go to Admin > Support and ticketing > Email Settings > Advanced settings.

2. Under Automated actions, enable Create a new contact when a ticket is received from a new email address. Then click Save.

New contacts will now be created automatically whenever a ticket is received from a new email address, ensuring all incoming requests are captured and linked to a contact.

Import contacts

Customers and contacts can also be imported directly to Atera in bulk. For more information, see Import data to Atera

Entra ID integration

By integrating with Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure AD), Atera allows you to effortlessly import and synchronize your organization's contacts, ensuring your Atera contacts are always up-to-date. Learn more

Send email to new contact

Send a welcome email automatically to newly added contacts with customized content, including the option to send portal credentials. For more information on including portal credentials, see Provide portal credentials - Automatic Password Provision Upon Contact Creation

Note: The email will be sent to contracts added manually and automatically.

To send an email to a new contact:

1. Go to Admin > Support and ticketing > Email Settings > Advanced settings.

2. Under Automated actions, enable Send email to new contact. Then click Save.

New contacts will now receive immediate, predefined communication — helping streamline onboarding and improve response times.

Deactivate a contact

Deactivate contacts that are no longer active or relevant to keep your contact list organized. You can reactivate them at any time if needed. Learn more

Note: Once deactivated, contacts cannot create new tickets. However, any existing tickets are not affected.

To deactivate or delete a contact:

1. Go to Customers > [Customer] > Contacts. Then select the contact.

The Contact page appears.

2. Click the ellipses menu () on the top right of the contact page. Then click Deactivate.

A confirmation window appears.

3. Click Deactivate contact.

Once deactivated, the contact can no longer create new tickets — via email, the Customer Portal, or other supported channels. Any existing tickets remain unaffected and can continue to be managed as usual.

Deactivated contacts are marked with a 'Deactivated' pill in the Customer > Contacts page.

Activate a contact

Activate a contact to restore access for someone who was previously deactivated. Once reactivated, the contact can create new tickets again and resume normal interaction across all supported channels.

To reactivate a contact:

1. Go to Customers > [Customer] > Contacts. Then select the deactivated contact.

The Contact page appears.

2. Click the ellipses menu (). Then click Activate contact.

Once reactivated, the contact can create new tickets again — via email, the Customer Portal, or other supported channels.

Activated contacts are marked with a 'Activate' pill in the Customer > Contacts page.

Delete a contact

Delete a contact when they are no longer relevant to your organization. While this removes the contact from your system, any existing tickets remain unaffected. You can recreate the contact at any time if needed.

To delete a contact:

1. Go to Customers > [Customer] > Contacts. Then select the contact.

The Contact page appears.

2. Click the ellipses menu (). Then click Delete contact.

A confirmation window appears.

3. Click Delete contact.

Once deleted, the contact can no longer create new tickets — via email, the Customer Portal, or other supported channels. Any existing tickets remain unaffected and can continue to be managed as usual.