Party management

Think of the party master as your organization’s central, shared address book in Zefort. It holds all the companies, vendors, and clients linked to your agreements. Keeping this master list organized ensures your contract metadata stays completely accurate and makes searching for specific agreements effortless.

Parties can be added to your master list in a few different ways:

• Manually: You can create parties yourself either directly within a contract’s metadata or right inside the parties list.
• Automatically by AI: Zefort AI automatically creates parties when it processes your documents and detects the contract parties.
• Via API: Parties can be created from other systems using Zefort’s API.

To open your party master, click Parties in the left-hand navigation menu.

What permissions do you need?

• To view and edit the parties list: You need the “Can manage parties” permission. This also allows you to update party details directly from inside your individual contracts.
• To create and manage custom party metadata*: To create custom metadata fields for your parties, you need an administrator license with both the “Can manage account settings and tags” and “Can manage custom metadata” permissions. Read the full guide on creating custom party metadata.* Note: Custom party metadata is an add-on feature that must be included in your organization’s subscription. If it is not currently enabled for your account, please reach out to our sales team to get it set up.

Searching and filtering parties

You can look for a single organization or find a group of multiple parties at once. Combine the free-text search with metadata filters to narrow down your list to see only the parties you need.

Text search

Use free text search to find parties. The search looks in following values:

• Party name
• Party ID
• Party aliases (such as previous or parallel trade names)
• Country codes (always use the two-letter format, such as FI, SE, or DE)

Filter with party metadata

Filters narrow down your list based on specific criteria. You can filter your list by party name, creation time, number of contracts, or any custom metadata fields in your account.

Adding and editing parties

Add a new party

1. Open Parties and click the Add party button.
2. Fill in the details for the party.
3. Click Create.

Updating party metadata

Click on a party in your list to change its information. When you open a party profile, you can update its metadata and adjust specific backend settings. By default, every party profile includes two standard fields: Party name and Party ID. If your administrator enables custom metadata for your account, you will also see your organization’s unique custom fields here.

Adjust party settings
You can change how the system manages each organization by adjusting these settings:

• Permanent party – Turn this on to keep a party in your system permanently. The system will not delete a permanent party, even if you remove it from all contracts.
• Visibility level – Control who can view the party details. You will only see this option if your organization restricts access to certain information. You can choose between two options:
  • Open: Every user in your account can see the party.
  • Restricted: Only users who already have access to the party’s contracts can see the party.

Party aliases

Enter alternative names for the party, such as previous corporate names, acronyms, or secondary trade names. When the AI detects an alias in a contract, it automatically links it to the main party name. Note that you can only use each alias name once across your account.

Once you have edited the needed details, click the button “Confirm & Save…”

Delete a party

If you no longer need a party, open the party menu and click Delete party. Click Delete again to confirm.

Merge parties

If you for example find duplicate entries for the same organization, you can combine them into a single record.

1. Select the checkboxes next to the duplicate parties.
   • Click View contracts if you want to double-check their agreements before combining the parties.
2. Click “Merge“.
3. Select which party name you want to keep as the main name.
   • Check the box if you want to save the other names as aliases for the new, merged party.
4. Click Merge to confirm.
   • Note: The merging process runs in the background. You can safely close the window and continue working while the system finishes the update.

Customize your party table view

You can change how your party table looks to focus on the information you need. Hover your mouse over any column header and open the menu to use these options:

• Sort ASC / Sort DESC / Unsort – Sort the table by that column in ascending or descending order.
• Pin to left / Pin to right / Unpin – Lock a column to either side of your screen so it stays visible when you scroll.
• Hide column – Remove a column from your current view.
• Manage columns – Choose exactly which fields you want to see, or reset the table to the default layout.

Set the default columns for your account (admin)

If you are an account administrator, you can choose which party columns users sees by default. To set these standard attributes for everyone, go to Account settings > Appearance > Party columns and select the fields you want to display.

Download party data

You can export your party details into an Excel spreadsheet.

1. Select the checkboxes next to the parties you want to export. If you select nothing, the system exports your entire list.
2. Click the Download button.
3. Choose your report type:
   • Download results with current columns – This exports only the columns you currently see on your screen.
   • Download full party data – This exports all available details for the selected parties.