# Set the primary contact

```http
PATCH https://secure.yoprint.com/v1/api/store/{team_slug}/customer/{hash_id}/contact/{id}/primary
```

- API version: v1
- Operation ID: `v1_public_customer_contact_primary`
- Section: Customers › [Customer contacts](https://developer.yoprint.com/reference/customer-contacts.md)
- Web page: https://developer.yoprint.com/reference/customer-contacts/v1-customer-contact-primary/
- Authentication: `Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY`

Makes this contact the customer's primary contact; the previous primary contact stops being primary. Emails YoPrint sends to the customer itself go to the primary contact. Returns the contact.

## Permission

Needs the Manage Customers permission ("Manage All" or "Manage Assigned to User"). Whether the customer is assigned to you is not checked.

## Business rules

- Customers synced from Shopify are read-only here: changes are refused with 422 `validation_error` "External customers are read-only. Manage changes from Shopify." System customers (`is_system: true`) are refused the same way ("System customer cannot be modified or deleted.").
- Contacts synced from Shopify are read-only (422).

## Side effects

- Sends `customer_contact.updated` for the new primary contact and for the previous one.
- When the contact's email already belongs to a Customer Portal account on your team that can't open this customer yet, saving the contact gives that account access to this customer (active when the account is set up with a verified email or a password, invited otherwise). No email is sent.

## Path parameters

- `team_slug` (string, required): Your team slug, shown as Team ID next to your API key in Profile. Example `your-team`.
- `hash_id` (string, required): The customer's id (`id` from List customers or Create a customer). A hash id from an earlier answer; unique keys and document numbers (such as `PO0042`) don't work here. Example `EDhVUaC6jbLbed`.
- `id` (string, required): The contact's id (`id` from List a customer's contacts, or from List a vendor's contacts). A hash id from an earlier answer; unique keys and document numbers (such as `PO0042`) don't work here. Example `uAu3dAKIaHyAYk`.

## Request body

This operation takes no request body.

### Example request

```bash
curl -X PATCH 'https://secure.yoprint.com/v1/api/store/your-team/customer/EDhVUaC6jbLbed/contact/uAu3dAKIaHyAYk/primary' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY' \
  -H 'Accept: application/json' \
  -H 'X-Yoprint-Decimal-Format: exact-v1'
```

## Response

`200` Successful response.

Fields:

- `data` (object, required)
  - `created_at` (string (date-time), required)
  - `first_name` (string | null, required)
  - `id` (string, required)
  - `is_primary` (boolean, required)
  - `trashed` (boolean, required): True when the contact is deleted.
  - `updated_at` (string (date-time), required)
  - `customer_id` (string, optional): Customer contacts only.
  - `default_receive_sms` (boolean, optional)
  - `email` (string | null, optional)
  - `external_type` (string | null, optional)
  - `fax` (string | null, optional)
  - `fax_country` (string | null, optional)
  - `is_external` (boolean, optional): True for a contact synced from Shopify; such contacts are read-only.
  - `last_name` (string | null, optional)
  - `phone` (string | null, optional)
  - `phone_country` (string | null, optional)
  - `send_invoice` (boolean, optional): Customer contacts only.
  - `vendor_id` (string, optional): Vendor contacts only.
- `status` (integer, required)
- `success` (boolean, required)

Example response:

```json
{
  "data": {
    "created_at": "2026-11-01T09:00:00+00:00",
    "customer_id": "V4keXwwxMQyXw7",
    "default_receive_sms": false,
    "email": "alex@example.com",
    "external_type": null,
    "fax": null,
    "fax_country": null,
    "first_name": "Alex",
    "id": "cBoKHftCid2dDD",
    "is_external": false,
    "is_primary": true,
    "last_name": "Rivera",
    "phone": "+1 201 555 0123",
    "phone_country": "US",
    "send_invoice": true,
    "trashed": false,
    "updated_at": "2026-11-01T09:00:00+00:00"
  },
  "status": 200,
  "success": true
}
```

## Errors

- `401` The API key is missing or wrong (`unauthenticated`).
- `403` You are not allowed to do this. `api_access_not_in_plan`: your team's plan doesn't include API access (Pro and above, with an active subscription or trial), so every request answers this until the team upgrades. When your role lacks the permission the operation needs, the body is only `{"message": "Insufficient Permission"}`. Other refusals use the error envelope, with `unauthorized` or `user_is_not_authorized`.
  - When: Your role has no Manage Customers permission. This 403 has a short body, `{"message": "Insufficient Permission"}`, with no `success` or `error`. Fix: Ask a team owner to give your role Manage Customers.
- `404` Not found. `page_not_found`: the team slug is unknown, you are not a member of the team, or an id in the path is not one of this team's. `code: null`, with a message that starts "No query results for": there is no record with that id.
  - When: The contact is deleted, or belongs to another customer. `error.code` is null and `error.message` names the record type. Fix: Restore it first.
- `422` The request was refused and changed nothing. `validation_failed` lists what to fix in `error.fields`; other codes name a business rule, explained in `error.message`. A few checks answer with only `{"message": "..."}`. An operation that calls another service (a payment provider, a carrier, an accounting app) can answer `connect_timeout` ("Please retry again") when that service does not answer in time: the change may or may not have happened there, so read the record back before you retry.
  - When: The customer comes from Shopify, or is a system customer (`error.code` `validation_error`, with the reason in `error.message`). Fix: Change Shopify customers in Shopify. System customers cannot be changed.

## Related

- [List a customer's contacts](https://developer.yoprint.com/reference/customer-contacts/v1-customer-contact-index.md): `GET /v1/api/store/{team_slug}/customer/{hash_id}/contact`