Understand profile and membership purge automation
Profile and membership purge automation allows your property or brand to:
Maintain a clean, compliant guest database by removing outdated or inactive records.
Automatically inactivate loyalty memberships that have not met activity thresholds.
Permanently remove profiles that have exceeded defined inactivity windows.
Align data retention practices with regulatory and brand requirements.
The CRM evaluates profiles against configured purge rules on an automated schedule. Rules are applied in numerical order, starting with rule one, and all criteria within a rule must be met before any action is taken. This means each condition in a rule is an AND statement. A profile must satisfy every requirement to be affected.
Purge automation can be configured whether or not your property uses a loyalty program. Profile purge rules for non-loyalty profiles can operate independently of loyalty-specific rules.
⚠️Important: All purge rule setup and changes are performed by the SHR team. Clients cannot configure purge rules themselves. To enable this feature or request changes, contact the SHR team.
Before reviewing how each rule type works, it is important to understand the distinction between inactivation and purge.
Inactive – The guest profile remains in the CRM. For loyalty members, the membership can be reactivated. Inactivated profiles are not deleted.
Purge – The guest profile is permanently removed from the CRM and cannot be recovered. If the guest stays again after a purge, a new profile is created from scratch.
Purge rule types
The CRM supports four rule types, each targeting a different category of profile.
Non-loyalty profile purge
This rule targets hotel-type guest profiles that do not have a loyalty membership. A profile is eligible for purge when all of the following criteria are met:
The profile creation date is older than the configured minimum age threshold.
The guest has no reservation history within the configured lookback window based on the last checkout date.
The guest has no future reservations on record.
When a non-loyalty profile is purged, any marketing-only profile sharing the same email address is also automatically purged.
Loyalty membership inactivation
This rule targets active loyalty members. It places the membership into an inactive state rather than deleting it permanently. A profile is eligible for inactivation when all of the following criteria are met:
The guest has a loyalty member ID.
The guest's membership is currently active.
The profile creation date is older than the configured minimum age threshold.
The guest has no reservation history within the configured lookback window, based on the last checkout date.
The guest has no future reservations on record.
The configured inactivation cycle check has passed.
When a loyalty membership is auto-inactivated, the following actions occur automatically:
All loyalty credits are expired via a negative points posting.
All rewards are set to Expired status.
The member's loyalty tier is reset to the default level.
The auto-deactivated flag on the profile is set to true.
New reservations created after inactivation do not automatically reactivate a deactivated membership. If a CRM user manually deactivates a profile outside of the automated process, they must manage any credits and rewards manually.
Inactivation cycle: The timing of when inactivation is applied to a member is controlled by a per-client configuration called the profile inactive setup. This defines a re-evaluation cycle for example, every six months. The elapsed time is measured either from the guest's original loyalty join date or from the date of their most recent inactivation event, depending on how the rule is configured. The cycle check ensures inactivation is applied at predictable intervals rather than immediately upon meeting the criteria.
Auto-reactivation: If the CRM detects that a previously inactivated member no longer meets the inactivation criteria for example, they have new reservation history, the membership is automatically reactivated and the auto-deactivated flag is cleared.
Loyalty membership purge
This rule targets loyalty members who have already been inactivated and have remained inactive for a defined period. Permanent purge is triggered when all of the following criteria are met:
The guest has a loyalty member ID.
The guest is currently inactive, the de-active flag is set.
The profile creation date is older than the configured minimum age threshold.
The guest has no reservation history within the configured lookback window.
The guest has no future reservations on record.
The guest has been inactive for at least the configured minimum inactive duration.
Loyalty membership purge should be configured to align with the expected lifecycle of any remaining credits or rewards, ensuring those items have already been expired before the profile is removed.
Marketing-only profile purge
This rule targets marketing-only profiles or records that have no reservation history. A profile is eligible for purge when all of the following criteria are met:
The profile creation date is older than the configured minimum age threshold.
The profile has had no email opens within the configured lookback window.
Because marketing-only profiles have no reservation history by definition, email engagement is used as the activity signal rather than checkout dates.
Viewing and managing profile status
You can view the inactivation status of any profile directly on the guest record.
Auto-deactivated is checked: The CRM has automatically inactivated the profile based on purge rules.
Auto-deactivated is unchecked: The profile has not been auto-inactivated. A CRM user may have manually deactivated it, or it remains active.
Reactivating inactive loyalty profiles
Inactive profiles can be reactivated, subject to your configuration. There are two paths for reactivation as listed below.
Guest self-reactivation via the guest portal
Guest self-reactivation is only available when the membership reactivation setting is configured to allow it. This setting is managed by the SHR team.
The membership reactivation field has two options:
Automatically
The guest can reactivate their own membership through the guest portal without CRM user involvement.
When set to automatically, the guest self-reactivation flow is as follows:
The guest attempts to log in to the guest portal.
The system prompts the guest to confirm they wish to reactivate their membership.
Once the guest confirms, they proceed as a reactivated member.
Manually
Self-reactivation is not available to the guest. A CRM user must reactivate the membership on the guest's behalf. Follow the steps below to search for an inactive guest profile and reactivate their loyalty membership.
From the left navigation menu, click Profile Management.
Click Guest.
Enter the guest's name, email address, or loyalty member ID in the search fields.
To narrow results, filter by status and select inactive before searching.
Click Search.
Locate the guest in the search results and click Edit on the guest's record.
On the Modify Guest page, reactivate the profile using one of the following methods:
Click Reactivate in the action bar at the top of the page, or
Scroll to the bottom of the profile form and check the Active checkbox.
Click Save and Close.
📌Note: Profiles that have been permanently purged cannot be restored. If a purged guest stays again, a new profile is created.
Frequently asked questions
Outlined below are a list of frequently asked questions.
What happens if a purged guest makes a new reservation?
Because the profile has been permanently deleted, a new profile is created for the guest when a reservation is processed. Any previous stay history, loyalty membership, points, and rewards are not carried over.
Can a loyalty membership be reactivated after inactivation?
Yes, inactive memberships can be reactivated either by the guest through the guest portal or by a CRM user. Permanently purged profiles cannot be restored.
Are new reservations enough to automatically reactivate a deactivated membership?
No. New reservations do not automatically reactivate a deactivated loyalty membership. Reactivation requires either the guest to confirm via the guest portal or a CRM user to act on the request manually.
Does purging a non-loyalty profile also remove associated marketing profiles?
Yes. When a non-loyalty hotel profile is purged, any marketing-only profile sharing the same email address is automatically purged at the same time.
Do transactional emails still send to inactivated profiles?
Inactivation affects loyalty membership status and suppresses automated loyalty communications. Transactional emails related to active reservations may still send depending on your configuration. Contact the SHR team for clarification specific to your setup.
Can we configure purge rules ourselves?
No. All purge rule configuration is managed by the SHR team. To request changes or to enable purge automation, contact the SHR team.