Linking Burials to People (Beta Feature)

We're testing a new way to manage burial records in Cemify by linking them directly to People records. This update simplifies data entry, improves family relationship tracking, and sets the foundation for more powerful features in the future.

What is included in this article:

What’s Changing

Previously, burials and People existed as separate records. You might have entered "John Doe" as a burial, and again as an owner or purchaser—each as distinct entries. With this update, burials are connected to centralized Person records. This means one record per individual, regardless of their role (deceased, owner, purchaser, etc.)

Person-specific details like date of birth, date of death, gender, and veteran status are now part of the Person record. When entering a burial, you’ll select an existing Person or create a new one.

This simplifies your workflow and helps ensure relationships between individuals—like spouses buried in adjacent plots—are easier to see and manage.

How the Migration Works

If you’d like to try this beta, email support@cemify.com and we’ll handle the migration for you.

Here’s what happens after activation:

  • A new Person record will be created for each burial in your account.
  • Cemify will automatically identify possible duplicates and suggest “High Confidence Merges.” These are cases where the burial and an existing person record:
    • Have exactly matching prefix, first name, middle name, last name & suffix
    • Are linked to the same plot
    • Have no conflicting fields

These merge suggestions will appear on a dedicated “Review Merges” page, where you can confirm matches individually. If everything looks correct, we can approve them in bulk for you.

If some People and Burial records don’t match exactly—for example, one includes a middle name or initial and the other doesn’t—they will remain as separate records for now. You can manually merge them later at your convenience.

What You’ll Notice After the Migration

Once the migration is complete:

  • Your “People” tab will include all newly created individuals who are connected to burials.
  • When adding a new burial, you’ll be prompted to link it to a Person.
  • Person-specific fields now live within the Person record, as opposed to the burial.

This keeps your data cleaner and allows you to avoid re-entering the same names over and over.

Looking Ahead

Right now, some burial information (like date of death or veteran status) will require an extra click to view, since it’s stored on the Person page. We’re actively working on improvements to show more of this info directly on the burial view.

We’re also redesigning the People page to make key details easier to see and better highlight relationships between individuals.

Frequently Asked Questions

❓- What if some burials and people weren’t matched automatically during migration?

That’s expected in some cases, especially when there are small differences in names—like one record having a middle initial and the other not. These records won’t be merged automatically but can easily be cleaned up using the manual merge tool.

To manually merge:

  1. Go to the People tab.
  2. Search for the name of a known duplicate (e.g., “Jane Peterson”).
  3. Check the boxes next to the two duplicate records.
  4. Click Merge at the top of the list.
  5. Confirm the merge details, then click Merge People.

We’re continuing to improve how matches are identified, but this tool lets you resolve one-off issues as needed.

❓- What happens if I don’t merge all duplicates right away?

That’s totally fine. Unmerged records won’t affect system functionality. You can manage merges gradually, whenever convenient.

❓- Does this change how I create burials?

Yes. When adding a new burial, you’ll now select a Person record to link it to. You can either choose an existing person or create a new one. Person details like birth and death dates are now stored on that Person record.

❓- What happens to existing People I created for plot sales or ownership?

Those records remain intact. If they match a burial record exactly—same name, same plot, no conflicting data—they’ll be suggested as a merge. Otherwise, they’ll remain as separate records until you choose to merge them manually.