In this article:

• Why does this happen? 
• What happens when merging two items? 
• How do I merge items with duplicated SKUs?
• Troubleshooting notes
• eZCom integration tips
• Shopify item duplications
• Title Merge

Why does this happen?

Having items with duplicate SKUs in your store may indicate a problem. This may happen when:

• Creating a new page for the product in your webstore.
• Connecting an additional webstore.

If orders come in against the new item, but the inventory is associated with the original item, this can cause orders to be held.

SKUs are unique. If the SKU duplication is not intentional and represents the same physical item, they should be merged.

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What happens when merging two items?

When merging items, one of them will be the “main” item and the others will be merged into it:

• The resulting item will keep the SKU code, scancodes, and scancode aliases of the “main” item.
• Their history will be combined as if they were always one item.
• The item history will have a new line titled "Merged duplicate SKUs"
• The item quantity balance will have been rewritten, adding the quantity of all combined items.
• Nothing will be lost: orders, history, and shopping cart connections will all reference the “main” item.

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How do I merge items with duplicated SKUs?

There are three ways of merging items with duplicated SKUs:

• Option 1: Auto-merge all items with one click
• Option 2: Merge items individually
• Option 3: Use the Item Details page to merge items

The DUPLICATE SKUS page allows you to execute an automatic merge of all items that share the same SKU or manually select which should be merged.

Go to Inventory > Browse/Search, and click Duplicate SKUs at the top right corner.

Option 1: Auto-merge all items with one click

To merge all items with one click on the Duplicate SKUs page, mark the Auto-merge items with duplicate skus checkbox and click Save.

NOTES:

• The SKU that is kept after the merge will vary, depending on several factors: Which SKU is the oldest, has the most existing orders, has the most images, and whether the SKU is part of a bundle.
• Newly-detected SKUs will be merged after a delay of your choosing (the default time is 30 minutes). Why a delay? It allows you to clone products in your shopping cart, and then update to the correct SKU if the product is different.
• If you are cloning items to create new ones, be mindful to make any updates in a timely manner to avoid auto-merging items that should not be merged together. A longer wait time is recommended.
• If auto-merge is enabled but your SKUs are not unique, products will ship incorrectly. Whiplash cannot be held liable for mis-ships that occur from incorrect SKU merging.

Option 2: Merge items individually 

You can also perform this operation with any item listed on the Duplicate SKUS page by clicking on Review & Merge:

Then, select which item should be kept as the main item for the SKU; the other items will be merged into it and subsequently disabled:

Option 3: Merge items on the Item Details page

Additionally, items with the same SKU can be merged on the Item Details page.

The SKU Merge button is visible when opening any item and going to the Details tab. Keep in mind this button will be there even if the SKU is not duplicated.

The next screen is just like the Review and Merge option from Option 2:

• If two or more items share the same SKU, two or more items will be visible on each column.
  Select which to keep and which to merge and disable.
• Having only one option in each column means the SKU is unique.

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Troubleshooting notes

• Subscription services create new variants that cannot be matched in our system. When auto-merge is enabled, these new variants can cause an inaccurate or unexpected merge. 
• To reflect merge changes on items that were already placed in a shopping cart, use the bulk action Set Info From Items.

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eZCom integration tips

This only applies to direct eZCom integrations. 

When new items are added to eZCom beyond the initial integration sync, they’re duplicated in RyderShip. This is expected behavior and requires merging the duplicate SKUs in RyderShip.

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Shopify item duplication

While creating items in Shopify, avoid creating products and variants by duplicating products and variants. It's easy to leave the same SKU or barcode and cause confusion when the new items are synced to Whiplash. If Shopify barcodes are set to sync with Whiplash, these can be added as alternate scancodes when the product is first duplicated. Scancodes can be disabled, but this should be avoided since Shopify doesn't prevent duplicate barcodes.

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Title Merge

The Title Merge feature is similar to merging SKUS but for identical items with different titles. For more information, see Title Merge.

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Related questions:

How to I manage duplicate SKUs? 

What happens when I merge two items?