Impact of Allowing Accounts creation Without Email in sys_user Table

[Amey Kapse]

Hi Community,

We’ve encountered a situation where ADM accounts are not being created in our ServiceNow instance due to missing email addresses from the LDAP source. After further investigation, we learned that these accounts intentionally lack email addresses for security reasons, and the source system cannot provide that data.

To address this, we’re considering a design change that would allow ADM accounts (typically identified by a specific naming convention) to be created in ServiceNow even if the email field is empty.

We’d really appreciate hearing how others have approached similar scenarios. Specifically:

• What potential impacts should we be aware of (e.g., notifications, approvals, licensing)?
• Have you implemented any best practices to flag or differentiate ADM accounts?
• How do you mitigate risks like workflow stalls or confusion in user lookups?

Thanks in advance for your insights!

[JenniferRah]

We do not sync ADM accounts from LDAP, because for us those accounts are specifically used for admin access to other systems. There's never a need to assign a ticket to an ADM account in ServiceNow, so we don't sync them at all. 

Additionally, our ADM accounts are named as the user plus the ADM suffix. So user John Doe will have a "John Doe" account and a "John Doe-ADM" account. It would be confusing for people to see both accounts in assignment lists, so that's another argument for not synching them.

As far as licensing, my understanding is that if they are active accounts and not listed as Web service access only, then they will count as a license.

Notifications obviously wouldn't be sent to an account without an email address, but how approvals and workflows are handled will be up to how you implement things. I hope this information is helpful.