Title: Duplicate user & ghost user
Last modified: October 29, 2017

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# Duplicate user & ghost user

 *  Resolved [rtd2](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rtd2/)
 * (@rtd2)
 * [8 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/)
 * [@lapzor](https://wordpress.org/support/users/lapzor/)
 * I have been doing some testing this weekend and noticed a couple things that 
   I believe are bugs:
 * 1. On more than one occasion, changing a user’s email address in WordPress resulted
   in two records being created in MailChimp – one with the old email address and
   one with the new address.
 * 2. Despite deleting user X from WordPress (and deleting all records from MailChimp),
   the sync still adds user X to my MailChimp list.
 * NB I am running MailChimp for WordPress 4.1.10 and MailChimp User Sync 1.5.4.
 * I hope to hear from you soon.
 * Thanks,
    rt.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

 *  Plugin Contributor [Lap](https://wordpress.org/support/users/lapzor/)
 * (@lapzor)
 * [8 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/#post-9639766)
 * 1. MailChimp uses email as “key field” and we can’t “change” the email over API,
   so we create a new subscriber instead. We don’t want to delete the old data so
   we leave that user active as well. I wish there was a better solution…
 * 2. MailChimp subscriber should have been deleted. If you can confirm that never
   working you may create an issue here: [https://github.com/ibericode/mailchimp-user-sync/issues](https://github.com/ibericode/mailchimp-user-sync/issues)
 * Hope that helps!
 * Kind regards,
 *  Thread Starter [rtd2](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rtd2/)
 * (@rtd2)
 * [8 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/#post-9677299)
 * Lap,
 * Thanks for the response.
 * 1.That’s a shame. Might it not be better to unsubscribe the old email address(
   from MailChimp), that way the user doesn’t still receive emails at their old 
   address; the address doesn’t count as a MailChimp subscriber; the historical 
   data is not lost; the admin can easily see the old email address and clear it
   out if they want?
 * 2. I moved server and installed the versions of MailChimp for WordPress (4.1.11)
   and User Sync (1.6) that you released in recent days. The problem seems to have
   gone away, but I will keep an eye on it.
 * Thanks,
    Richard
 *  Plugin Author [Danny van Kooten](https://wordpress.org/support/users/dvankooten/)
 * (@dvankooten)
 * [8 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/#post-9677395)
 * Hi Richard,
 * I totally agree with unsubscribing the old user being a better solution. I believe
   we’re doing it like this for compatibility with MailChimp’s older v2 API but 
   I think we can slowly phase that out.
 * We’ll take a look at getting rid deleting the subscriber!
 *  Thread Starter [rtd2](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rtd2/)
 * (@rtd2)
 * [8 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/#post-9680153)
 * Sounds good Danny. I’ll look out for the change. Until then, I will stop users
   from updating their email address via MailChimp. Hopefully no one unsubscribes
   because of it.
 * Thanks,
    rt.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

The topic ‘Duplicate user & ghost user’ is closed to new replies.

 * ![](https://s.w.org/plugins/geopattern-icon/mailchimp-sync_cfeefa.svg)
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## Tags

 * [duplicate](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/duplicate/)

 * 4 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [rtd2](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rtd2/)
 * Last activity: [8 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/duplicate-user-ghost-user/#post-9680153)
 * Status: resolved