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Question

Search contacts by company VAT Number

  • February 5, 2026
  • 2 replies
  • 39 views
A
Apprentice

Hi everyone,

Currently, the majority of our contacts are associated with a company.

We use a custom text field on the Company object called “VAT Number”, which is unique and works well to identify companies.

Here’s what I’m seeing so far:

  • I can successfully search for a company using the custom field VAT Number

  • However, when I search for the same VAT Number in the Contact search, no results are returned

Question:
Is there a way to configure the contact search bar (on ticket creation) so that entering a company’s VAT Number will return all contacts associated with that company?

Target functionality:
When someone calls in:

  • The agent asks for the VAT Number and the caller’s name

  • The agent searches using the VAT Number

  • If results are found, the agent selects the correct contact from the list

  • If no results are found, the agent proceeds with creating a new contact under that company

Additional context:
Not all contacts have a dedicated email address or mobile number, which makes searching by company identifier (VAT Number) essential for correctly identifying callers and avoiding duplicate contacts.

Any guidance or possible workarounds would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

2 replies

Helina
Community Manager
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  • HelinaCommunity Manager
  • Community Manager
  • February 21, 2026


Hi Alex,

Greetings from Freshworks community. 

We understand that not all contacts have a dedicated email address or mobile number, which makes searching by company identifier (VAT Number) essential for correctly identifying callers and avoiding duplicate contacts.

As a workaround, we do have an field called Unique external ID which can help you with your case. You can add the VAT number in the unique external field. This will help your agents to search the contacts based on the VAT number that is stored in the unique external ID.
 

 


Please let me know if this will work for your use case. If you are facing any issues, you can always reach out to support@freshdesk.com and we will be happy to assist you.

A
Apprentice
  • alexandros
  • Author
  • Apprentice
  • February 24, 2026

Hi,

Thanks for the suggestion. I tested using Unique External ID, but unfortunately it doesn’t work for our use case.

The issue is that the Unique External ID field enforces uniqueness per contact. When a company has multiple contacts, adding the same VAT Number to one contact works, but attempting to add the same VAT Number to another contact results in a “contact already exists” error and prompts to merge/associate with the existing contact.

Since multiple contacts belong to the same company and must share the same VAT Number, this field cannot be used as a searchable company identifier.

So at the moment, it seems the contact search cannot return contacts based on a company-level custom field (like VAT Number), and the Unique External ID workaround only works when the value is unique per individual contact, not shared across several contacts.

If there’s another way to make contact search reference company fields, I’d be happy to test it.

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