3315381 - Issues when merging duplicate candidates

After merging duplicate candidate profiles that have been submitted by different Agencies or Employees (Employee Referral), the wrong Agency or Employee Referral information is displayed on the candidate profile that was selected to be the master / primary candidate profile. 

SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting Management

There are different scenarios covered in this KBA:

1. Agency 1 Candidate 1 vs. Agency 2 Candidate 2: 
   Agency 1 Candidate 1 is created first and Agency 2 Candidate 2 is created afterwards. 
   After merging these two candidates and making Agency Candidate 1 as the Master Profile, Agency 2 appears to own the Master Candidate (Candidate 1). Expectation is that Agency 1 should own this candidate instead as this Agency 1 submitted the candidate first and this is the profile that has been made as the Master one. 
2. Agency Candidate vs. Self-owned Candidate: 
   Self-owned Candidate is created first while Agency Candidate is created afterwards. After merging these two profiles and making Self-owned Candidate as the Master Profile, this candidate appears to be owned by the Agency. Expectation is that the Master profile is self-owned and not owned by any Agencies as the self-owned profile was created first and this is the profile that has been made as the Master one. 
3. Self-owned Candidate vs. Referred Candidate: 
   Self-owned Candidate was created first and Referred Candidate afterwards. After merging these two profiles and making the Self-owned Candidate as the Master profile as it was submitted/created first, this Master Profile shows the Employee Referral information. Expectation is that this candidate shows as self-owned and not referred as it was created first and this is the profile that has been made as the Master one. 
4. Referred Employee 1 vs Referred Employee 2: 
   Referred Employee 1 was created first and Referred Employee 2 afterwards. After merging the 2 profiles and making Referred Employee 1 as the Master profile, the candidate profile shows both Employee Referrals information while the application page shows the correct one (the one linked to the 1st profile that was created). Nevertheless when proxying the 2 employees that referred the candidates, we see that they both own the candidate. 
5. Referred Candidate vs Agency Candidate: 
   Referred Candidate is created first and Agency Candidate afterwards. After merging these two profiles and making the Referred Candidate as the Master profile, both the Agency Ownership and Employee Referral information are shown on the candidate profile. Expectation is that the Master profile shows only the Employee Referral information as the Referred candidate profile was created first and this is the profile that has been made as the Master one. 

This is a product limitation and expected system behaviour. 

Candidate ownership: the Agency will be listed as owning the candidate in the database for the length of time specified in this setting. After this period of time has elapsed, the Agency’s ownership over the candidate will show as expired. This means that the Agency owns the Candidate from the time of Creation Date to the Expiration date.

The existing behaviour is that the Agency (or Employee in the scenario of Employee Referral) which owns the Candidate for the farthest date among the two will be retained. It has been observed that it considers even the time of creation of the candidate, when both Creation date and Candidate Ownership days are equal. 

As soon as a candidate is created by an Agency or referred by a friend (Employee Referral), there is an entry made in the RCM_REFERRAL table in the data base.
It is the EXPIRATION_DATE in the RCM_REFERRAL table in the data base which determines the Agency or Employee Referral and higher/farther the Ownership expires on date.

Changing this behaviour will require an enhancement request. Please feel free to submit a new idea in the SAP Customer Influence Portal by following the steps outlined in KBA 2090228 - How to Submit Ideas for SAP SuccessFactors Products.

For the time being there are two possible workarounds:

• Wait for the longest/farthest Ownership to expire before merging the duplicate candidate profiles.
• Process the candidate that should be the Master Candidate Profile and disqualify the other one. After the master candidate has been hired and the Agency commission or Employee Referral processed merge the duplicate candidate profiles.

Merge, Wrong, Candidate, Agency, Ownership, Employee, Referral, RCM-66118 , KBA , LOD-SF-RCM-CAN , General Candidate Issues (not Offers, not Profiles) , Problem