Dynamics 365 Business Central now integrates with Microsoft Outlook.

Without leaving Outlook, users can manage Business Central functions. Business interactions between customers and vendors can be performed seamlessly, increasing business productivity and improving user experience.

What is Dynamics 365 Business Central?

Dynamics 365 Business Central is Microsoft’s leading solution for SMEs. It unifies ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) capabilities allowing you to run your entire business with intelligent applications that work seamlessly together in the cloud. A new feature is available that integrates Business Central with Outlook.

How can I access this feature?

Dynamics 365 Business Central users can access the new feature by installing ‘Dynamics 365 Business Central add-ins’. Alternatively, users can manually install the Dynamics 365 Business Central add-in into their Outlook account. Once the add-in has been installed, users will be able to access the Business Central features with ease on the Outlook ribbon.

What does the new add-in do?

Overview

Without leaving Outlook, users can manage financial data related to customers and vendors, as well as create and send financial documents, such as quotes and invoices. In addition, customer insights and quick-search functionality improve the user experience greatly by removing multiple steps or the need to manage multiple systems.

Manage customer information

With the Outlook add-in, contracts can be created and managed from the first email received from a customer. This helps users access required information about customers in one location. In addition, users can create brand new contacts and edit the details of existing ones. This new contact information automatically syncs to Business Central. Maintaining up-to-date contact information across systems, saving users time.

Document creation

Using the add-in users can create the following documents directly from Outlook:

• Sales Quote
• Sales Invoice
• Sales Order
• Sales Credit Memo
• Purchase Invoice
• Purchase Credit Memo
• Purchase Order

Create invoices from meeting appointments

Some businesses record all billable appointments in the Outlook calendar. The new add-in allows the creation of an invoice for the customer directly from the calendar item.

In a similar manner as within an email, the user will open the appointment and the Business Central add-in will recognise the customer contact and record. Users can then look up existing information, create an invoice or another sales document all within Outlook. If the attendee is a new contact or customer, users can link them to an existing customer or create a new customer record that will synchronize back to Business Central from Outlook.

Quick document lookup

The Business Central Outlook add-in enables quick access to documents mentioned in email messages. The add-in is available for an email message if a document number is recognised in the body of the message. This allows users to access Business Central documents and make any modifications without leaving Outlook. Actions available from within Outlook include: sending for approval, posting, printing, emailing and adding comments.

This new add-in is a welcome addition to Dynamics 365 Business Central. Not only will the new feature allow customer enquiries to be responded to more promptly, but it also provides a seamless interaction between the two systems, creating a more efficient experience for Dynamics 365 Business Central users.