Smoother Handling of Visitor Accounts and Helpers

Gather has released an update to make managing visitor accounts and case helpers more seamless for funeral homes.

The Previous Issue

Previously, when someone like John Smith signed up for a visitor account (using an email like john@gmail.com) and was later added by a funeral home as an uninvited helper, the system created two separate records. If the funeral home later updated the helper’s email to match the visitor account, the system did not properly merge the two accounts. In some cases, this could even cause errors.

What’s Changing

With this update, Gather now follows clearer business rules to keep everything organized and consistent:

• ✅ Uninvited helpers can now be merged.
  If an uninvited helper is updated to use an email address that already belongs to a visitor account, Gather will automatically replace the duplicate helper record with the visitor’s account. All references – such as being listed as the informant on a death certificate – will update to the correct user.

• ❌ Invited helpers cannot be merged.
  If an invited helper is updated to an email that already belongs to an existing account, Gather will prevent the merge. Instead, funeral homes will see a clear error message:
  “This email belongs to another user. You cannot merge an invited helper with an existing account.”

Why This Matters

This update ensures that:

• Funeral homes don’t have to manage duplicate accounts for the same person.
• Visitor accounts remain the single source of truth for families and friends who sign up themselves.
• The system avoids errors when invited helpers have existing accounts.

What to Expect

For funeral homes, this means less cleanup work and fewer errors when managing helpers. For families, it means their visitor accounts stay connected to all the right places within Gather.