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Enable Standardisation

Overview

Standardisation rewrites country and state values into one consistent format. Whether a user enters USA, United States or US, the record stores whichever form you have chosen, so reports, filters and integrations all see the same value.

It runs on save, through the object's trigger, so it applies to records created by your users and to records arriving through the API or a data load. See Activate Triggers.

Only the country and state fields are standardised. Street, city and postal code are left as they were entered, unless you also use verification.

Step 1: Turn Standardisation On for an Address Block

  1. Click the App Launcher to search for and select AddressTools Administration.
  2. Select Address Blocks from the left menu.
  3. Open the block for this address by using the dropdown to select Edit.
  4. In the Global Settings section, select Standardize Country and Standardize State as required.
  5. Click Save.

Repeat for each address block you want standardised. The two settings are independent, so you can standardise country without touching state.

Step 2: Set the State Format per Country

Standardize State in Step 1 is a switch rather than a format. Selecting it tells AddressTools to standardise the state on that address, and the Country record then decides what the standardised value looks like for each country. Without the block setting the state is not standardised at all. With it, the Country record decides whether the state is stored as a subcountry code or in full.

State formats are set on the Country record rather than org-wide, as conventions differ by country.

  1. Navigate to the Countries tab and select the All list view.
  2. Click Edit beside the country.
  3. Select Use Subcountry Code in State field to store the code, such as TX, or leave it clear to store the full name, such as Texas.
  4. Click Save.

Repeat for each country whose state format you want to change.

Note: State formats differ by country which is why these are optional. For example, a US address is written with the two-letter state code, whereas an Italian address is written with the state in full, so Use Subcountry Code in State field is selected for the United States and clear for Italy.

Step 3: Turn Standardisation On for Your Org

  1. In AddressTools Administration, select Settings from the left menu.
  2. In the Feature Enablement section, click the pencil icon beside Standardization Enabled.
  3. Select the checkbox, then click Save.

This is the master switch for standardisation. The settings made above only take effect once it is on, and turning it off later stops all of it.

Step 4: Choose the Country Format

  1. Still in Feature Enablement, click the pencil icon beside Country Standardization Format.
  2. Choose the format you want stored, then click Save.

Five country formats are available, shown here for Egypt:

Format Stored value
Name Egypt
ISO 2-letter code EG
ISO 3-letter code EGY
Native name (local characters) مِصر
Native name (Latin characters) Miṣr

Note: Country Standardization Format is shown at all times but can only be edited once Standardization Enabled is selected, which is why it follows Step 3. The format applies org-wide, to every address block. ISO codes are consumed more readily by integrating systems; full names display better on a page layout.

Alternative Names

AddressTools ships two objects that widen what standardisation recognises:

  • Alternative Country Names holds other names and common misspellings that should resolve to a country.
  • Alternative State Names does the same for states.

Some are installed for you. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are all supplied as alternative names for the United Kingdom, so any of them standardises to your chosen United Kingdom format.

Neither object has a packaged tab, so reach them through the App Launcher or add a tab for them in Setup. Add your own records to either object when your data contains names AddressTools does not yet recognise. Both objects are populated during the data installation, so add to them afterwards rather than before. See Install Country Data.

Note: An alternative name only helps if the value can be matched to an installed country or state. If a value resolves to nothing, standardisation leaves it alone, and it is Validation that decides whether the record can still be saved.