If you’re looking for a way to simplify your business operations and improve your productivity, you might want to consider integrating Dynamics 365 Business Central with Outlook.
This powerful combination can help you manage your customers, vendors, and documents without leaving your inbox.
In this article, we’ll show you how to use the Business Central add-in for Outlook and how it can benefit your business.
We’ll also share some tips and tricks on how to get the most out of this integration and where to find business central help if you need it.
What is the Business Central add-in for Outlook?
The Business Central add-in for Outlook is a feature that lets you access Business Central data and functionality directly from your Outlook emails and calendar appointments.
It consists of two smaller add-ins:
Contact insights
This add-in provides you with Business Central customer or vendor information in Outlook emails and calendar appointments.
It also enables you to create and send Business Central business documents, such as quotes and invoices, to a contact.
Document view
This add-in provides you with a direct link from an email to the actual business document in Business Central, such as a sales order or a purchase invoice.
With the Business Central add-in for Outlook, you can:
- View customer or vendor details, such as contact information, balance, overdue amount, sales history, and more.
- Create new customers or vendors from Outlook contacts or email addresses.
- Create and send quotes, orders, invoices, credit memos, and other documents from Outlook.
- Convert quotes to orders or invoices with one click.
- View document status and history from Outlook.
- Open the document or the customer or vendor card in Business Central for more action.
How to get started with the Business Central add-in for Outlook?
There are two ways to get the Business Central add-in for Outlook installed, depending on your role in the organization:
- As a Microsoft 365 administrator, you can use Centralized Deployment to install the add-in automatically for the entire organization, groups, or specific users.
- As any user, you can install the add-in for your own use if your admin hasn’t already deployed it for you.
- Once the add-in is installed, you can access it from any new or existing email message or calendar appointment in Outlook.
- If you’re using the Outlook app, go to the ribbon and look for Business Central. Or if you’re using Outlook on the web, at the top or bottom of the email message, look for the… (more actions) button.
How to use the Business Central add-in for Outlook?
Let’s see some examples of how you can use the Business Central add-in for Outlook to streamline your business processes.
Example 1: Create and send a quote to a customer
Imagine that you receive an email from a customer who wants to buy some products from you.
You can use the Business Central add-in for Outlook to create and send a quote without leaving your inbox.
Here are the steps:
- Open the email from the customer and click Business Central in the ribbon or … (more actions) button.
- The Business Central add-in pane will open on the right side of the email. It will recognize the sender as a customer and display their details. If the sender is not a customer yet, you can create one by clicking Create as Customer.
- To create a quote, click New and select Quote from the drop-down menu.
- A new quote will open in a pop-up window. You can fill in the details such as items, quantities, prices, discounts, etc. You can also use the + (add line) button to add more lines or the… (more options) button to access more fields and actions.
- When you’re done, click OK to save the quote.
- The quote will appear in the Business Central add-in pane under the Documents section. You can click Send to email the quote to the customer as a PDF attachment. You can also click View/Edit to open the quote in Business Central or Convert to convert the quote to an order or an invoice.
Example 2: View a document from an email
Imagine that you receive an email from a vendor that contains a document number, such as a purchase invoice number.
You can use the Business Central add-in for Outlook to view the document without leaving your inbox.
Here are the steps:
- Open the email from the vendor and click Business Central in the ribbon or … (more actions) button.
- The Business Central add-in pane will open on the right side of the email. It will recognize the document number in the email body and display a link to it.
- To view the document, click the link. The document will open in a pop-up window. You can see the details and status of the document, such as the amount, due date, payment method, etc.
- You can also click Open in Business Central to open the document in Business Central for more actions, such as posting, paying, or printing.
How to get the most out of the Business Central add-in for Outlook?
Here are some tips and tricks to help you make the best use of the Business Central add-in for Outlook:
- If you use Outlook on the web, you can pin Business Central so that it is always immediately visible instead of having to go to the… (more actions) button.
- You can customize the fields and actions that appear in the Business Central add-in pane by using extension packages in Business Central.
You can use keyboard shortcuts to quickly access and use the Business Central add-in for Outlook. For example, you can press Alt+Shift+Y to open or close the add-in pane or Alt+Shift+N to create a new document.
