Tips & Tricks Series: Power Automate - Part 1 Automated Flows Driven by Events and Transactions

Welcome to the Western Computer LinkedIn newsletter. This bimonthly series provides tips and tricks for helping you and your internal teams work more efficiently in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central. With more than 37 years in business, Western Computer has deployed 1,250+ solutions, including more than 350 in the cloud. In this LinkedIn newsletter series, we share the expertise we have accumulated to empower Dynamics 365 Business Central users and enable them to work as proficiently as possible.

In a previous video , Marcelo Borges ?— a Microsoft Dynamics Consultant?at Western Computer— introduced the four types of automation offered by Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central Cloud in conjunction with Power Automate. You can create these automations in your environment to unlock a whole new set of potent tools to boost team collaboration:

This first blog in a four-part series explores the two types of Automated Flows: Those triggered by database transactions when a record is created, modified, or deleted; and those triggered by business events—such as requesting approvals, blocking customers, releasing documents, and a customer exceeding their credit limit.

Database transactions provide significant flexibility, allowing you to trigger Automated Flows based on the creation, modification, and deletion of records in selected tables within API (v1.0) for Business Central and v2.0 .?

Automated Flows Driven by Database Transactions

Here are a few ideas for automated flows driven by database transactions:

• When creating a customer, notify a Teams channel: This is ideal for a team with multiple inside sales reps, where a smaller team is designated for data quality. Don’t you hate customer cards with typos and missing phone numbers! ???
• When modifying an item, send an e-mail: A possible use in this scenario is notifying the warehouse manager by e-mail that an item has been set to <Blocked> or <Sales Blocked>.
• When deleting a G/L account, sync with an external system: This flow proves handy when an external accounting partner does not use Business Central and would like to update your chart of accounts in their external system. As long as their external system supports Internet calls, keeping the two systems synced is a piece of cake. ??

Automated Flows Driven by Business Events

Business events can be any type of trigger previously coded by a developer. The Microsoft catalog of business events includes some of the most important pre-developed events:

• Customer is blocked/unblocked.
• Customer credit limit has been exceeded after posting a sales invoice.
• Sales order is released.
• Sales order is shipped.
• Purchase order is released.

A developer can enhance your custom extensions by adding external business events so you can trigger Power Automate flows based on your customizations.??

Check out this link to find out more about building and installing extensions for custom business events .

Throughout this blog series you will see how some of these automations can be accomplished in different ways — using the various types of flows in Business Central and Power Automate.

Stay tuned for the next post of this four-part blog series on Power Automate flow types that covers Approval Flows.

To Learn More

Western Computer offers deep expertise across the Microsoft technology stack, particularly in Dynamics 365 Business Central Cloud. Our thought leaders can help you ensure your critical ERP application meets your business needs for today and beyond. For more information on where to find and how to use these Business Central tricks, check out the complete blog?on the Western Computer website. And for help in designing, deploying or supporting Microsoft Dynamics 365 solutions, contact Western Computer today.

About Western Computer

Western Computer is a Microsoft partner that many companies across North America trust to design, deploy, and support Microsoft solutions. We offer deep expertise across the Microsoft technology stack, particularly in Dynamics 365 Business Central. Our thought leaders can help you ensure your critical ERP application meets your business needs for today and beyond. This includes building a roadmap that enables your organization to take advantage of technology that helps you grow and compete in your industry. We provide dedicated teams of senior-level experts to deliver and align project teams with the culture of our customers to meet your requirements for technical and industry expertise.