iMessages from a contact showing as phone number not name in Catalina....

[MikeElmendorf]

On all my Macs, iMessages from a particular contact (my wife, no less) are coming up in notifications showing her number, not her name.

It recognizes it is her/associates the contact, as it shows her contact picture, but displays the number not her name.

She seems to be the only contact doing this, and even more oddly, in threads with multiple people, the others will show their name in the notification and she will be in the middle as a number.

This same thing is happening on my two MacBooks and my iMac I upgraded. On my Mac I have not upgraded it is behaving normally, as it is on my iPad and iPhone. So, it definitely appears to be a Catalina issue.

There is nothing odd in her contact entry and it is not duplicated.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

 

[Just_Me_D]

That is indeed strange and I don’t know why it’s happening to you. I text quite a bit via my MacBook Pro and all of the names my contact display. Hopefully, the issue will clear itself, especially being that it is only occurring with one contact.

 

[Lee_Bo]

I've had this happen before but ALL contacts in iMessage appeared as phone numbers. Never had just one contact act that way.

Hopefully someone will chime in that has seen that.

 

[doogald]

I don't have Catalina yet, but this is happening with my wife's contact in watchOS 6, fwiw. The notification properly shows her name, but going into the messages app shows just her number. All other contacts are fine.

 

[Lee_Bo]

I'm on Catalina and no issues with contacts.
@MikeElmendorf, are you also using an Apple Watch?

 

[MikeElmendorf]

Yes, but have not noticed this issue on any device other than the Macs on Catalina.

 

[Lee_Bo]

Yes, but have not noticed this issue on any device other than the Macs on Catalina.

Ok, just for grins and giggles, let’s try this:

Open the Apple Watch app, go to General/Reset/Reset Sync Data. When you select Reset Sync Data, it will appear as nothing is happening. All the “magic” is happening behind the scenes. Wait a while then all devices.

I’ve had this work in the past but all my messages were showing up as numbers.

Worth a shot.

 

[Wotchered]

This may be because of how your wife has set up her “allow contact on” or actual contact entry. we have just suffered something similar and rectified it. I cannot tell you how because it was a group and I suppose we all fiddled with it. But I’ll bet that something has changed, this kind of thing sometimes occurs after updates, or someone “tidies up” an entry.

 

[MikeElmendorf]

Lee -

I've had the issue where contacts disappear from the watch and what you've suggested fixes it. Are you saying that you think this could rectify the issue I'm having on the Macs running Catalina? I don't see how it could.

 

[Lee_Bo]

Lee -

I've had the issue where contacts disappear from the watch and what you've suggested fixes it. Are you saying that you think this could rectify the issue I'm having on the Macs running Catalina? I don't see how it could.

I don't either but it won't hurt to try. At least then we'll know it did or didn't work. That's why it's called "troubleshooting a problem".

 

[MikeElmendorf]

Ok--gave that a shot. Didn't work.