Two Google Analytics Codes - both not collecting correctly - google-analytics

Question

I have inherited a site which has two GA-UA codes.
These are setup like this
// first code
ga('create', 'UA-XXXXXXXX-1', 'auto');
ga('send', 'pageview');
//second code
ga('create', 'UA-XXXXXXXX-1', {'name':'second'});
ga('second.send', 'pageview');
I have no idea why they are setup like this and indeed do not understand the syntax of the second tracking code
The following can be observed
THE FIRST CODE
Custom events working and being successfully collected
Linked successfully to Adwords
Only has a few months of data and therefore we don't want to use this
THE SECOND CODE
Does not record custom events
Can't link to Adwords
Has years of data attached to it that we want to use
The plan is to just use the second code
For complete brevity custom events are being triggered like this
ga('send', 'event', 'Contact', 'contact-form', 'Goals');
My questions is this
"Because it has lots of historical data we wish to use code two but it is not collecting custom events. How do I get the second code to collect custom events so we can retire the first code? "

Answer 1

If you use two trackers on one site you need to give a name to at least one of them, else the first tracker is overwritten when the second one is initialized.
Thus the syntax for your second piece of tracking code - when the tracker is initialized it is assigned a name, in your example "second".
If you want to send data to that tracker you need to prepend the assigned tracker name to the send call, in your example:
ga('second.send', 'event', 'Contact', 'contact-form', 'Goals');
That is why the second tracker does not receive your event tracking calls, they are only being sent to the first "unnamed" tracker (actually if a tracker name is not assigned it defaults to t0).
Also do not think you can link an Adwords account to two different Google Analytics accounts, so. you'd need to unlink the first account and then link the second one.