Deduplication policies

Duplicate types

Kernel categorizes all accounts into one of the following types:

Type	Definition
Primary	Primary record Note that duplicates of this account may exist, but this is the record that is recommended to survive the merge.
Exact	Two accounts are an exact match when they share the same Kernel ID, or when their legal name, legal country, name, and trading country all match, or when their URL, name, and legal name all align.
Location	Physical establishments of the same legal entity sharing the same domain — for example, hotel locations, offices, or stores operating at different URLs under the same root domain. One account must be classified as an Establishment.
Regional	The trading presence of a legal entity in a different country. For example, the UK trading entity of a company whose legal registration is in Germany. Identified when two accounts share the same legal name but operate in different trading countries.
Trading	The trading entity linked to its legal entity within the same country — for example, the operating brand of a holding company. Identified when two accounts share the same legal name, one as the legal identity and one as the trading identity.
Website	Accounts sharing the same URL and name. A softer match than Exact — legal name alignment is not required. Off by default; can be enabled per configuration.

Regional account policy

You can treat regional duplicates in one of two ways:

1. Treat regional sites as subsidiaries (keep separate, e.g., amazon.fr is a child of amazon.com)

2. Treat regional sites as duplicates (collapse into the global parent)

This setting is relevant for determining the https://github.com/generatemomentum/documentation/blob/main/legacy/configuration/cleaning-action.md

Primary record selection

When Kernel identifies duplicate records in your database, it automatically selects one as the Primary and marks the others as duplicates. The primary record is the one that all others will merge into or reference.

How primary records are selected

Selection is determined in the following order:

1

Duplicate type priority

The type with the highest priority in the group takes precedence. Where multiple types are present, the hierarchy applied is:

Exact > Location > Regional > Trading > Website

2

Identity type

For Regional and Trading groups, the legal entity is preferred over the trading entity.

For Location groups, the parent entity is preferred over the establishment.

3

CRM field values

CRM fields configured for primary selection are compared across remaining candidates. By default, risk score and last activity date are used. The record with the highest value is preferred.