At our school, we have decided to internally create inquiries as opposed to providing a link on our website that parents fill out. Upon processing, we decided we would not assign parents a username or a password; they could do that on their own if they choose to apply. We thought, and understood, that if and when a prospective family (an inquiry) chooses to apply, they would go through the normal process and that we could merge profiles when they submitted the application. However, it seems this is not the case. Parents who are already in our system as an inquiry are having trouble as the system says it recognizes their email. This is causing some problems, and is rather inconvenient for parents, because now we need to create a username and password for these families, who need to contact us, to get the online application process started. It also feels a little strange to do this on the backside without notifying parents. I don't understand why the system won't just allow the parents to create a duplicate and have us merge profiles upon processing. This is after all what we do with existing parents in the system who have a younger child applying and accidentally create a duplicate. I would like to see this same process, of merging profiles, for parents who are already in the system as an inquiry so that they can go through the process normally. 

Any suggestions from schools who are currently using the inquiries feature would also be appreciated!

Thank you