Escalating Cases in D365 Customer Service

If you or your organization is using Dynamics 365 Customer Service then you probably have the need to escalate cases. This functionality is something that can be easily build in the application. In this article I am doing to discuss how that can be done. I previously wrote an article about how to setup automatic case assignment which you can find here, and I am going to build the escalation logic on top of that solution. We will extend the entity that was build previously (Drop Down value) to track where the ticket should be escalated to (tier 2 or tier 2 support) and I am going to create a workflow to automate this.

Solution

We will use the out of the box ‘isescalated’ field (which is a yes/no option field) to start the escalation. When a user sets this field to ‘yes’, the custom ‘escalate case to’ field (option set) will show up on the business process flow. Users can select Tier 2 support or Tier 3 support to escalate to. A workflow will assign the case to the team that is selected in the ‘Tier 2 Support’ or ‘Tier 3 Support’ team populated on the drop down value record. (This is the category or subcategory field on the case. In my example I’m using the subcategory field, but if you prefer using the category field you can do that as well.)

Configuration – Drop Down Values

We are going to add 2 new fields to the new_dropdownvalue entity which will store the team record the case will need to be escalated to. Login to https://make.powerapps.com/ and expand the data section on the left, then click entities. Find the Drop Down Value entity and add the 2 fields: they are both lookup fields to the team entity and I am going to name them ‘Tier 2 support’ and ‘Tier 3 support’.

After you add the fields, make sure to add them to the form as well. You can do this by navigating to forms while you are still in the drop down value entity.

Configuration – Case

We also need to add a custom field to the case entity, you can do this by navigating to the case entity and clicking on fields. Click ‘+Add field’ and select option set as the data type. The values are going to be ‘Tier 2 Support’ and ‘Tier 3 Support’. Add the new field and the ‘isescalated’ out of the box field to the case form. Don’t forget to save and publish all of the configurations you just made!

Create Support Teams

You might have different tier 2 and tier 3 support teams for each ticket category or subcategory related to the case: for example if there is an issue with a bill the support team would be someone that works in accounting (Tier 2 – Accounting and Tier 3 Accounting) but if there is an issue with a product, you might want to send it to the product tier 2 or 3 support team.
To create the teams click on the gear icon in the top right corner and select ‘Advanced Settings’, then click the drop down arrow ‘Settings’ and click ‘Security’. Click on ‘Teams’ then click ‘+New’ on the ribbon. Enter the team’s name, and other required fields. Select ‘Owner’ as the team type.
Make sure you create all the support teams for each existing category (or subcategory) record. If you’re using the same escalation teams regardless of the category (or subcategory), obviously you would only need to create two teams; ‘Tier 2 support’ and ‘Tier 3 support’. After you create the teams, make sure you give them the proper security roles and add the members to the teams.

Once the configurations have been saved and published and the teams have been created make sure you update all the drop down records in the system with the correct teams. Remember, we’re using these drop down records on the case entity to show which category and subcategory a case belongs too.

Escalation Workflow

We want this escalation to happen pretty quickly, so I am going to use a real -time workflow for this. Navigate to processes by clicking the gear icon in the top right corner and select ‘Advanced Settings’, then click the drop down arrow ‘Settings’ and click ‘Processes’. Click ‘+New’ on the command bar. Enter the process name (Case escalation), the category is workflow and enter ‘case’ as the entity. Make sure to uncheck the box that reads ‘Run this workflow in the background’. Click ‘OK’ and the workflow window will load. Select organization in the scope field, and check the box next to ‘record field change’ as when the workflow should start. Click on the select button next to ‘record field change’. Select the new ‘Escalate case to’ field that we created earlier then click OK. Execute as ‘the user show made changes to the record’. (Make sure users have the appropriate security roles to fire this workflow). Click Add step and click on ‘check condition’. Then click ,condition. (click to configure). The condition is as follows:

– Case > Escalate Case to > Equals > Tier 2 Support
and
– SubCategory > Tier 2 Support > Contains Data

Click ‘save and close. Click on ‘select a row and click add step’ then click on the ‘add step’ button and select ‘assign record’. Click on the ‘set properties’ button of the step that was just added. Click in the ‘Value’ field in the window that opened up. Set ‘look for’ to Sub Category, set the second field to ‘Tier 2 Support’. Click ‘Add’ and OK. Click Save and close.

Click on the top line (in the steps section) and click ‘add step’ and select ‘check condition’ again. (If you add values to the ‘Escalate Case to’ field at any time, you can easily update the workflow at any time with conditions for those values.) The condition is as follows:

– Case > Escalate Case to > Equals > Tier 3 Support
and
– SubCategory > Tier 3 Support > Contains Data

Click save and close. Now click on ‘select a row and click add step’ under the condition you just created then click on the ‘add step’ button and select ‘assign record’. Click on the ‘set properties’ button of the step that was just added. Click in the ‘Value’ field in the window that opened up. Set ‘look for’ to Sub Category, set the second field to ‘Tier 3 Support’. Click ‘Add’ and OK. Click Save and close. Lastly I like to add a final step to stop the workflow.

Lastly you could also add a business rule to the form that shows the field ‘Escalate Case to’ when the out of the box ‘isescalated’ field is set to yes, and of course you can add these fields to a business process flow to streamline the process.

I hope you enjoyed this post! Be sure to check in again next week for a new article or subscribe here to never miss another post!