Allow full control of phone number formatting (prevent Web View override)
Organizations need the ability to define and maintain their own phone number formatting standards, including the option to leave formatting set to “none.”
Currently, formatting set at the database level can be overridden in Web View, which introduces inconsistencies. This impacts:
Record matching and lookup reliability
Overall data consistency
Reporting, especially when additional system-driven phone types (e.g., international variants) are introduced
For organizations managing both domestic and international constituents, a single, internally defined format is often preferred over multiple system-imposed formats.
Request:Respect database-level formatting choices in all interfaces, including Web View
Allow formatting rules to be independent of phone type
Ensure formatting consistency supports matching, lookup, and reporting functions
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Elizabeth Johnson ⭐ Community All-Star
- Apr 1 2026
- Reviewed: Voting Open
Related ideas
In general, I've found international phone number formatting to be very inconsistent even when everything is set up "properly" according to current formatting. This is something that needs to be fixed for those of us who have international contacts.
As per support: Regarding the current roadmap (of Unified View) as we're informed of and the information, I received from our development team; there are no plans to change this.
Please reconsider as any discrepancies in web view are NOT EDITABLE at this moment. If there is no way to go into database view, we will never be able to use Phones as a reliable match as the Country Codes are not editable as they are removed in the edit fields in web view. If they are not included or are included on the record, we cannot make any changes to that data as it stands. This is a HUGE data integrity issue.
This is very important, not just for international organizations, but for all organizations that export contact lists for leadership or events like board thank-a-thons.