How can I get Apple to STOP trying to manage my contacts?

This is probably impossible...

My value as a contractor and businessman has always been my contact list.  Who I know.  Basically, its the equivalent of my Rolodex (for those of you who remember).

I started with a paper list of contacts.  Eventually that was typed into a Palm Pilot.  Then ported into a Blackberry.  Now an iPhone.

For years, my choice of phone was governed by how large a contact list the phone could handle.  There was a time when phones could handle 100 contacts, or 500 contacts.  At that time, my contact list was 3000.  I was VERY good at entering data in a manner I could find it even years later. (ie: "Who was that painter I used 5 years ago on that project in NC?  Ah!  Here he is!!)

Somewhere along the way, companies like Apple figured out that they could abscond the Rolodexes.  Even for people who don't collect that data well, Apple started doing it for you.  They imported contacts from text messages, emails, social media, etc.  and added them to contact lists.  They said it was to "improve the user experience".  (BS!  It was so THEY could make social media associations between EVERYBODY, and monetize it in selling ads).  

Thanks to Apple's "help", it's not unusual now for me to have the same name 6 or 8 different times in my contact list.  They just keep adding it every time they find something.  I now have 8420 names in my contact list on my phone.  (not cloud based contacts)

I don't mind the big list.  Like I said- I'm good at managing the data, and it only helps me when I need various vendors.

My problem is that they are now beginning to do the opposite.  They are purging old data.

I don't want my old data purged.  I can go several years before I need to find an old contact again, and now I am finding contacts missing from my contact list that I KNOW were there.  Sometimes they are things that are hard to get- like personal cell phone numbers of important CEOs or lawmakers.  I am nearing close-out on a job that has lasted for 1 1/2 years, and some of the vendors I used at the beginning of the job are no longer in my contact list.  I need to reach out to some of them to wrap up the job.

All I really want is for Apple to leave my darned contact list ALONE.  But I am pretty sure I won't get that (they've figured out how to make money on this).

Are there any ways to stop Apple from purging old contact names from a contact list on an iPhone?

There is a way to merge contacts but it needs to be done on a desktop from what I remember. 

In reply to Steve_Jones :

You can merge right at the phone, but you need to be in "Contacts"

In reply to SV reX :

I have never had any contacts purged. Are you sure they have not been reshuffled as maybe you had their last name in the spot for their first name, or something like that?

Always try and edit things through tbe contact app, its the best way. 

I feel your pain! Since I remember when a computer at the house was a novelty, I have watched... every upgrade, makes the system take more choices from ya. I like my devices to do what I tell them to do. Not what they think I want. 
Anyway, I keep my iPhone so newtered I've  never had that problem;  albeit, much smaller list!

Problem is, there is a ton of other stuff it also will not do, so probably not what many folks would want. Hey, just 'cause I'm paranoid, don't mean nobody is after me! 

Also my new I-6 might let me hold it back more than most folks phones, as well. I also still use my non color kendal, too. 
 

Sounds like you want to use an Apple device in a way other than how Apple wants you to use it, this is generally frowned upon

Turns out that having the phone connected to an Exchange server can open a can of worms with your contacts (Apple not playing well with non-Apple tech, news at 11):

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6717909

Some other settings to check:

https://www.igeeksblog.com/iphone-contacts-disappeared/

FWIW, contact management on my Android phone has been reliable, straightforward and trouble-free with the phone making no attempts to outsmart me - although it's not connected to Google.

My only suggestion is a contact list on a seperate device with no connection to anything but itself. I don't know if you can even buy such a thing, anymore. 

I don't know of any setting that would make iOS or iTunes purge older contacts.  I have some on my phone that are at least 20 years old (which, incidentally, were imported from my old Palm).

How are you syncing your phone - via iTunes, to a PC or Mac?

Via iCloud?

Slippery said:

In reply to SV reX :

I have never had any contacts purged. Are you sure they have not been reshuffled as maybe you had their last name in the spot for their first name, or something like that?

Always try and edit things through tbe contact app, its the best way. 

Nope. There are definitely contacts that have disappeared. 
 

Even searching with the correct phone number doesn't find them. They are gone. 

Duke said:

I don't know of any setting that would make iOS or iTunes purge older contacts.  I have some on my phone that are at least 20 years old (which, incidentally, were imported from my old Palm).

How are you syncing your phone - via iTunes, to a PC or Mac?

Via iCloud?

 

I don't sync it. I just use it locally on the device. 
 

Don't even remember how to use iTunes

So you're not backing the device up to anything at all?

May want to consider syncing to iCloud if nothing else.

In reply to Duke :

I said I'm not doing it. I didn't say Apple wasn't. Lol!

iCloud sync has covered me in the past

In reply to SV reX :

If you didn't turn iCloud on and tell it to back up your contacts, it's not doing so.

[edit] Is your iCloud storage full?

In reply to SV reX :

One of the many reasons my phone does not do a lot of things others think is so great to have a computer doing, is I will not allow it to access i-cloud. I cloud demands access to stuff it does not need, and I don't... well, you get it.

for example:
My phone will not allow me to see or reply to the address of someone that DMs me. You'd have to put your email in the body of the message 

No need, unless you want to say hello! In regards to other stuff... nothing personal. I'm just grumpy, sometimes. 
Still "love each and every one of ya, like a brother or a sister" (obscure music reference) I love everyone on here - even the few I don't like very much. And I like you a lot!!!

OK. You can have your thread back, now!