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Link Business Contacts to an Account

Outlook Developer Reference
Link Business Contacts to an Account

You can assign one or more Business Contact objects to an Account object, and set a Business Contact as the primary Business Contact for the Account. To add a Business Contact to an Account, set the Parent Entity EntryID property of the Business Contact to point to the EntryID property of the Account.

The following C# and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) code examples show how to link a primary Business Contact to an Account object.

  private void AddBusinessContactToAccount()
        {
        Outlook.ApplicationClass _app = new Outlook.ApplicationClass();
        Outlook.Application olApp = (Outlook.Application)_app;
        Outlook.NameSpace olNameSpace = _app.GetNamespace("MAPI");
        Outlook.Folders folders = olNameSpace.Session.Folders;
        Outlook.Folder bcmRootFolder = (Outlook.Folder)folders["Business Contact Manager"];
        Outlook.UserProperty userProp;

        Outlook.Folder accounts = (Outlook.Folder)bcmRootFolder.Folders["Accounts"];
        Outlook.ContactItem newAccount = (Outlook.ContactItem)accounts.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Account");
        newAccount.FullName = "Sara Hettich ";
        newAccount.FileAs = "Hettich";
        newAccount.Save();

        string accEntryID = newAccount.EntryID;

        Outlook.Folder businessContacts = (Outlook.Folder)bcmRootFolder.Folders["Business Contacts"];
        Outlook.ContactItem newContact1 = (Outlook.ContactItem)businessContacts.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Contact");
        newContact1.FullName = "Hao Chen";
        newContact1.FileAs = "Chen";

        if (newContact1.UserProperties["Parent Entity EntryID"] == null)
        {
            userProp = newContact1.UserProperties.Add("Parent Entity EntryID", Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.OlUserPropertyType.olText, false, false);
            userProp.Value = accEntryID;
        }
        newContact1.Account = newAccount.FileAs;
        newContact1.Save();

        string contactEntryID = newContact1.EntryID;

        if (newAccount.UserProperties["PrimaryContactEntryID"] == null)
        {
            userProp = newAccount.UserProperties.Add("PrimaryContactEntryID", Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.OlUserPropertyType.olText, false, false);
            userProp.Value = contactEntryID;
        }

        newAccount.Save();
					}
  Sub AddContactsToAccount()

Dim olApp As Outlook.Application Dim objNS As Outlook.NameSpace Dim olFolders As Outlook.Folders Dim bcmRootFolder As Outlook.Folder Dim bcmAccountsFldr As Outlook.Folder Dim bcmContactsFldr As Outlook.Folder Dim newAcct As Outlook.ContactItem Dim newContact1 As Outlook.ContactItem Dim newContact2 As Outlook.ContactItem Dim newContact3 As Outlook.ContactItem Dim userProp As Outlook.UserProperty

Set olApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application") Set objNS = olApp.GetNamespace("MAPI") Set olFolders = objNS.Session.Folders Set bcmRootFolder = olFolders("Business Contact Manager") Set bcmAccountsFldr = bcmRootFolder.Folders("Accounts") Set newAcct = bcmAccountsFldr.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Account")

newAcct.FullName = "World Wide Importers" newAcct.FileAs = "World Wide Importers" newAcct.Save

Set bcmContactsFldr = bcmRootFolder.Folders("Business Contacts")

Set newContact1 = bcmContactsFldr.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Contact") newContact1.FullName = "John Smith" newContact1.FileAs = "John Smith"

If (newContact1.UserProperties("Parent Entity EntryID") Is Nothing) Then Set userProp = newContact1.UserProperties.Add("Parent Entity EntryID", olText, False, False) userProp.Value = newAcct.EntryID End If

newContact1.Save

Set newContact2 = bcmContactsFldr.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Contact") newContact2.FullName = "Rajesh Rotti " newContact2.FileAs = "Rajesh Rotti "

If (newContact2.UserProperties("Parent Entity EntryID") Is Nothing) Then Set userProp = newContact2.UserProperties.Add("Parent Entity EntryID", olText, False, False) userProp.Value = newAcct.EntryID End If

newContact2.Save

Set newContact3 = bcmContactsFldr.Items.Add("IPM.Contact.BCM.Contact") newContact3.FullName = "Isabel Martins" newContact3.FileAs = "Isabel Martins"

If (newContact3.UserProperties("Parent Entity EntryID") Is Nothing) Then Set userProp = newContact3.UserProperties.Add("Parent Entity EntryID", olText, False, False) userProp.Value = newAcct.EntryID End If

newContact3.Save

If (newAcct.UserProperties("PrimaryContactEntryID") Is Nothing) Then Set userProp = newAcct.UserProperties.Add("PrimaryContactEntryID", olText, False, False) userProp.Value = newContact3.EntryID End If

newAcct.Save

Set newAcct = Nothing Set newContact3 = Nothing Set newContact2 = Nothing Set newContact1 = Nothing Set bcmContactsFldr = Nothing Set bcmAccountsFldr = Nothing Set bcmRootFolder = Nothing Set olFolders = Nothing Set objNS = Nothing Set olApp = Nothing

End Sub

See Also

Unlink Business Contacts From an Account | Office Developer Center: Outlook 2007