Want to get PSE organiser 11 to recognise duplicates at import

Question

I have recently acquired a macbook pro with mountain lion and bought photoshop elements because I am familiar with the windows version (older). (I want to keep the photos i download in folders i can see, not embedded in iPhoto).
The first batch of photos i downloaded from my iphone with iphoto and then imported into photoshop organiser without a problem.
But for subsequent batches i tried to download directly using import>from camera or card reader, and saving in a named folder within Pictures (and in subfolders according to date). This was fine the FIRST time I did it, but now it does not recognise any photos IMPORTED THROUGH ELEMENTS ORGANISER as duplicates. So every time I download photos from the iphone it duplicates them in my folders.....that is....all EXCEPT the ones that I originally imported from iPhoto.
It correctly recognises these as duplicates and allows me to deselect them before import. But NOT so, for the ones downloaded directly using Elements organiser.
I theorised that Elements organiser is changing the metadata files when it imports and subsequently not recognising the original ones it detects on my phone as the same image. So I experimented with choosing 'none' instead of 'basic metadata' as metadata template, and experimented with checking the option to 'preserve current name in XMP' but it did not make any difference and continued to not recognise duplicates (but ONLY those imported directly from the phone bypassing iphoto) no matter which Elements Organiser options were used when the image was downloaded for the first time. (The size of the file was 1-2kb bigger when 'none' instead of 'basic metadata' was used for the original, though.)
THE MAIN REASON I BOUGHT PHOTOSHOP ELEMENTS INSTEAD OF USING IPHOTO WAS SO I COULD SAVE MY IMAGES IN MY OWN FOLDER STRUCTURE.
But if I cant do this without either duplicating everything each time i import, OR having to mentally keep track of all the previously imported photos and manually select only the new ones (and run the risk of missing some), then it is unwieldy and a waste of money.
And there seem to be a lot of people with this problem on other threads and not all using macs. this seems like a very basic problem and surely should be fixed by the developers?????
LATER....
I have just discovered the SAME THING HAPPENS with my Panasonic Lumix DMC-T27. Files that are already imported are not recognised as duplicates when I take another photo and then try to import just the last photo. PSE organiser wants to import the whole card again. So far I have only tried it once with the metadata options set for "preserve current name in XMP" and "none" for metadata template (as opposed to Basic Metadata template).
I did notice in the info section for the duplicated images that the duplicates have different times. The 'Date Created' under "file properties" for each of the duplicates (.JPG, -1.JPG, -2.JPG -3.JPG) increases by what looks like the time it was added by the organiser.
Does this mean that PSE organiser is modifying the 'Date Created' info to match the time imported and then at next import it is using the modified "date Created" time to check for duplicates?? Of course they are all seen as new files if this is the case!! Can this bug be fixed if it is a bug?? (This would fit with the iphoto ones being recognised correctly as duplicates because the original files for these are still stored in iphoto and haven't been downloaded or modified when saved via PSE organiser.)
I have taken screen shots of an example that was imported 4 times using different options as above and the 'Date created' increases for all of them regardless of the options i fiddled with as mentioned above. I can email them to anyone who thinks it would help solve the issue.
I may be barking up the wrong tree with all of this, but any help or hope of a future fix would be much appreciated,
Thanks
Kerrie

Answer 1

I have had this problem of duplicate imports and used the following work around.
In the photo downloader, do not select any option that will in any way change the photo's name or metadata when it is imported. If there is any difference between the previous import and the file still on the camera, the downloader will not recognize them as duplicates and will import the camera file, yet again. In short, select "Do not rename files." "Advanced Options" should all be blank except the leave-pictures-on-camera selection. "Apply Metadata" should have only "Basic Metadata" selected with all other options blank.
Of course, one still has the previously imported "altered" files on the PC or Mac even if future duplicate imports from the camera stop. Solving this is simply laborious and time consuming. Import the photos, yet again, using the settings described above. Then use PSE to identify duplicate photos and, one-by-one, delete all duplicates from the catalog and hard drive except for the most recent import, which should in all respects be identical to the file still on the camera.
This worked for me. Hope it helps you.