Import a CSV file in People
Importing a CSV file is a great way to speed up entering your church's congregant information into Planning Center.
If you want to transfer your church’s congregant information into Planning Center, upload it in bulk! Export your data as a Comma-Separated Values (.csv) file from your existing database or favorite spreadsheet program. CSV files can be opened and edited in any spreadsheet program, such as Microsoft Excel, Numbers, or Google Sheets.
Tip
Follow the import guidelines to format your CSV before importing.
Upload a CSV file
A manager or organization administrator can upload a CSV file.
Select the People page from the top navigation.
Select the Actions button in the top right.
Choose Import & export CSV from the dropdown.
Select Start Import.
Drag and drop a CSV file into the popup, or select Choose file.
Match fields
If you used any fields in addition to the default fields, you can match the columns in your CSV file to fields in People during the match fields step of the import.
People detects new field options in your CSV and creates the missing options automatically during import. If you'd rather manage options yourself, you can disable this default setting by unchecking the Create new options detected from CSV fields option at the top of the page. This works for the following built-in and custom field types:
Built-in fields: Name prefix, Name suffix, Inactive reason, Marital status, and Membership type.
Custom fields: Dropdowns and checkboxes.
If you don't see a field you need, create it as a custom field before importing your file. You can also create a new one if needed during the import by selecting the dropdown in the People field column and choosing Create new field at the bottom of the dropdown.
On the People import page, review the columns and fields:
The CSV column name shows on the left. Compare the People field name in the middle with the column name to ensure the columns and fields match. View examples of the data to be imported in the Examples from CSV column.
If you have columns in your CSV file that you don't want to import, select Not Used in the People Field column dropdown.
If you upload the wrong file or notice in the examples that you missed some information, select Replace CSV file at the top of the page.
(Optional) Select the Empty fields should delete existing data option at the top of the page to remove any existing data from a profile if the CSV field is blank. Leave the box unchecked to ignore blank fields and keep the existing data.
Once you've verified each field, select X fields to import at the bottom of the page to generate a preview.
Preview data
View new or updated profiles and households, any errors the importer found, and all identical records in the import preview. Review a few profiles to ensure the data is being imported into the expected fields.
Use the tabs in the left sidebar to preview changes.
If you don't want to update or create a particular person or group of people, uncheck the box to the left of their name or select Ignore all.
If you have any errors in your file, go to the Errors tab in the left sidebar, then select Export CSV of these X profiles at the top of the page to make adjustments to these profiles. Uncheck the errored profiles, finish this import, then fix the errors in the exported file and re-import it.
Select Finish import to process your import and either update or create all selected profiles.
Import errors
These are the most common importing errors and how to fix them:
This error means there is either a blank column header, a line break on a column header, or the CSV file is delimited by a character other than a comma.
To fix these issues:
Enter a column header or delete the column completely.
Delete any extra rows that are part of the column header. Column headers must be on only one line.
Change the delimiter to a comma in your spreadsheet program's settings.
This error occurs if you don't match any of your columns to the first name and last name fields during the matching phase of the import.
To fix this, restart the import and match the appropriate columns to the first name and last name fields.
This error means a profile in your database has the exact same first name, middle name, last name, suffix, and email address as a row in your CSV file, but the Remote ID's do not match.
To fix this, match the Remote ID in your CSV file to the Remote ID in People.
This error means a person's email address in your CSV file is formatted incorrectly and needs to be fixed.
Organization administrator profiles can't be updated via CVS import, so you must update their profile manually.
Undo an import
If there are any errors in the import that you missed in the preview step, you can undo the import up to 48 hours after you imported it. Any fields and field options created by the import will not be deleted if the import is undone.
Warning
Undoing an import is permanent and cannot be reversed.
If you have merged any profiles from the import, do not undo the import. Undoing the import can completely delete the merged person from your database, removing any scheduled positions, registered events, donations, etc.
Undoing an import will have the following impact:
If a profile was created by the import, it will be deleted.
If a profile was created by the import and then chosen as the primary when merging with an existing profile, the profile will be deleted.
If two existing profiles were updated by the import, and then merged, any information imported for either profile from the merge will be reverted.
If the profiles created during the import were given administrator permissions, anything assigned will be unassigned, such as groups, lists, workflows, teams, etc.
If a data field was untouched by the import, the data will remain untouched.
If the import changed a field, but you manually change the same field after the import, it will revert to what it was before.
Follow the steps below to undo an import within 48 hours:
Select the People page from the top navigation.
Select the Actions button in the top right.
Choose Import & export CSV from the dropdown.
Select View Results on the right of the import you want to undo.
Select Undo in the top right to remove anything created or updated by the information in the import.
Type "Undo import" in the confirmation pop-up.
Select the Undo import button.
Import other data into Planning Center
Only profile information can be imported via CSV file. If you want to import other data into your Planning Center database, use the following options:
Attendance history: add previous sessions and enter attendance manually
Groups: create a custom field to store groups from a previous database, create lists based on that custom field, and use bulk actions to add them to a group
Check out the list of third-party integrations that will allow you to import data like notes, Giving history, and more.