Articles on: Contacts & counterparties

How do I delete contacts in ContractHero?

After an import or a trial phase, contacts nobody needs any more pile up quickly — duplicates, dead records, entries created by accident. You can delete a single contact, and from 30 October 2026 several at once. Two things matter: deletion is final, and only contacts with no linked contracts can be deleted at all.

The screenshots in this article show the German interface. The English label is given first, with the German label in square brackets.

Your benefit

A tidy contact list is more than cosmetics. If the picker shows five variants of the same company when someone creates a contract, contracts end up on the wrong record — and your answer to "which contracts hang off this partner?" stops being true. Instead of clicking away leftovers one by one, you clear the list in a single pass. The safeguards make sure you do not accidentally lose a contact that still has active contracts.

Delete a single contact

Open Contacts [Kontakte] in the left-hand navigation and click the contact. In the detail view, delete the record from the actions menu. ContractHero asks for a reason — this is mandatory and lands in the change log.

Nothing about the single-contact flow changes.

Delete several contacts at once

Available from 30 October 2026. Until then, delete contacts one at a time from the detail view.

1. Select the contacts

In the contact list, users with full access see a checkbox in front of every row. You either tick individual contacts or use "Select all" [„Alle auswählen"].

"Select all" always refers to your current filter or search — not to every contact in your organisation. So filter first (for example on "Number of contracts: 0"), and only then select everything.

2. Start the deletion

As soon as at least one contact is selected, the delete option appears in the toolbar above the list.

3. Read the confirmation dialogue

Before deleting, ContractHero shows a dialogue with two groups:

Contacts that can be deleted
Contacts that cannot be deleted — each with the reason, usually: the contact is still linked to a contract

That is your safety net. Only the first group is deleted; the second is left untouched.

4. Give a reason and confirm

As with a single deletion, a reason is mandatory. After that the contacts are deleted — permanently.

5. Notification

After a bulk deletion, users receive a notification, and by email too depending on their existing settings. That is the same logic as other bulk actions; there is no separate setting for it.

Frequently asked questions

Why can't I delete a contact?

Because it is still linked to at least one contract. That is deliberate — otherwise contracts would be left without a counterparty. Either remove the link on the contract, or use "Merge contacts" [„Kontakte zusammenführen"] to merge the record into the one you want to keep. The contracts move across and the duplicate disappears.

Do deleted contacts go to the trash bin?

No. The trash bin applies to contracts. Contacts are deleted permanently and cannot be restored. If you are unsure, export the view first via "Export view" [„Ansicht exportieren"] — then you still have the master data as a file.

Can I undo a deletion?

No. The change log shows which contacts were deleted when, by whom and with what reason — but the data itself is gone.

Who is allowed to delete contacts?

Users with full access. You can restrict delete rights via roles so that only certain people can delete. Anyone with write access but no delete rights does not see the checkboxes or the delete option.

I filtered and clicked "Select all" — how many contacts is that?

Exactly the ones your filter or search is showing right now. To be safe, check the "Count: X" [„Anzahl: X"] counter at the bottom left of the list before you delete.

What happens to the tasks on a contact?

Tasks hang off contracts and contacts. Since a contact with linked contracts cannot be deleted in the first place, in practice this only affects contacts with no contract. Check the Tasks [Aufgaben] tab in the contact detail view if you are not sure.

Good to know

Filter first, then select. Sort or filter the "Number of contracts" [„Anzahl Verträge"] column down to 0 — those are the records that can actually be deleted. Everything else is blocked by the dialogue anyway.
Merge rather than delete. For duplicates, "Merge contacts" is almost always the right route: you keep the contract links and decide field by field which value stays.
The reason is more than a mandatory field. It shows up in the change log later. "Cleaned up March test import" helps the next person asking far more than "old".
Export beforehand. Two clicks via "Export view" and you have the contacts' master data saved, in case somebody asks after all.
Contacts are also created automatically. The contract analysis creates counterparties by itself when needed. If your list keeps growing back, it is worth looking at how contracts get into your system.

Updated on: 10/28/2026

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