Update Record Types from the Edit Page

I’m sure you noticed a long time ago that in order to change the Record Type of a record in Salesforce you have to be on the View page for that record, not the Edit page. If you’re like me, then this makes no sense at all to you. Most users do not distinguish between changing a Contact’s phone number and changing its Record Type, so why do you have to go to two different pages to perform the two changes?

Well now you don’t, a long time ago we implemented Workflow Rules and Workflow Field Updates to automate changing Record Types based on changes made on an Edit page. For instance, let’s say you have a picklist field on Accounts called “Type” with values “Prospect” and “Customer”. And let’s also say that you have Account Record Types with the same names.

You can setup one Workflow Rule on Accounts that runs when the following criteria is met:

• Type equals Prospect
• Account Record Type not equals Prospect

Then setup a Workflow Field Update to change Account Record Type to Prospect.

You can then setup a second Workflow Rule on Accounts that runs when the following criteria is met:

• Type equals Customer
• Account Record Type not equals Customer

Setup another Workflow Field Update to change Account Record Type to Customer.

That’s it! Now remove the Account Record Type from your page layouts and never worry about it again!

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