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Unable to See Some Salesforce Contacts: Private Contacts, Sharing, and Lookup Visibility

Date de publication: Oct 12, 2026
Description

In Salesforce, users sometimes cannot see certain Contacts, either in a list view, through a shared link, or in lookup search results. This article describes three common situations and explains why they occur.

Situation 1: A sales rep creates a Contact and shares the link in Chatter. The other sales reps receive the "Insufficient Privileges" error, while the administrator can view the Contact.

Situation 2: A sales rep creates a Contact and it displays in the rep's Contacts list view. A manager above the rep in the role hierarchy cannot see the Contact in their list view, while the administrator can.

Situation 3: Sales reps cannot find a specific Contact in lookup search results. If your organization enabled Enhanced Lookups for Contacts, the Contact is visible in enhanced lookup search only to users with at least the "View All Records" permission on the Contact object. If your organization uses standard lookups, Contacts do not appear in search results for either standard users or administrators.

Notes:

  • This article applies to both Salesforce Classic and Lightning Experience.
  • Enhanced Lookups are not yet available in Lightning Experience.
Résolution

This article answers the question: why can some Salesforce users not see certain Contacts, and how do you fix it? The most common cause is a private Contact, which is a Contact that is not linked to an Account.

Why Private Contacts Are Not Visible

Contacts that are not linked to an Account are always private, regardless of your organization's sharing model. Only the Contact owner, System Administrators, and users with the "View All Records" permission for Contacts or the "View All Data" permission can view private Contacts. Users without the "Modify All Records" permission for Contacts or the "Modify All Data" permission cannot edit a private Contact record.

Sharing rules do not apply to private Contacts. If your organization uses divisions, private Contacts always belong to the global division.

How to Make a Private Contact Visible to Other Users

Associate the private Contact with an existing or newly created Account. This establishes the appropriate sharing and visibility for all users.

Customer Community Plus Users Cannot See Contacts

Note: To allow Customer Community Plus license users to view all Contacts associated with an Account they can access, enable the setting "Allow community users to see contacts that have not been enabled for communities."

Numéro d’article de la base de connaissances

000384762

 
Chargement
Salesforce Help | Article