Scheduling Unblu conversations with Microsoft Bookings

Microsoft Bookings enables customers to schedule appointments with an advisor. The Unblu integration for Microsoft Bookings creates corresponding Unblu scheduled conversations for the appointments scheduled using MS bookings. Customers then receive a calendar invite with a link to join the Unblu conversation.

Features

The following features are available:

Create Unblu scheduled conversations for the appointments scheduled by a customer using MS Bookings. Customers receive:
- A calendar invite with a link to join the scheduled conversation in Unblu
- An email containing a link to the appointment review screen where they can reschedule or cancel the appointment
Update the date and time slot of the Unblu scheduled conversations when an appointment is updated:
- By the customer on the appointment review screen
- By the agent on the MS Bookings Calendar page
Delete Unblu scheduled conversations when an appointment is canceled:
- By the customer on the appointment review screen
- By the agent on the MS Bookings Calendar page
Note that conversations are only deleted if their state is CREATED state and the customer never joined the conversation.
User mapping: it’s possible to associate the Unblu scheduled conversation with another agent than the one associated with the appointment.

The MS Bookings appointment isn’t affected, and emails are still sent to the original agent’s email address. The Unblu scheduled conversation, on the other hand, is created with the second agent’s email address.

It’s important to note that the relationship between MS Bookings and Unblu isn’t bidirectional. Changes you make to a scheduled conversation in Unblu don’t affect the appointment in MS Bookings.

Prerequisites

To use the Unblu MS Booking integration in your organization, you must:

Have Microsoft Office 365 Outlook. Older versions of Outlook aren’t supported.
Host the Unblu Outlook add-in server and configure it to enable synchronization. The Unblu MS Booking integration is based on the Unblu Outlook add-in server.

For further information, refer to Hosting the Unblu Outlook add-in server.

Creating a dedicated app registration in Azure

To use MS Bookings, you must create a dedicated app registration in the Azure Portal as described in the dedicated app registration. Make sure you complete the following steps:

Define the tenants that should be able to use the add-in deployment. You can change this later.
In the API permissions, add the following Application Microsoft Graph permissions:
- Calendars.ReadWrite
- Bookings.Read.All
- BookingsAppointment.ReadWrite.All
- Mail.Send
If you haven’t already done so, define a client secret for the Unblu Outlook add-in server.

`ConfigMap`

The following properties must be configured to enable support for MS Booking:

msBookingsEnabled: Set to true to enable Microsoft Bookings.
msBookingsCalendars: List of supported Microsoft Bookings calendars. Each entry consists of the following elements:
- tenantId: Tenant of the calendar. The tenantId must be in the list of tenantIds of the Outlook add-in.
- smtpAddress: E-Mail address of the Microsoft Bookings calendar.
- userId: Resource ID of the Microsoft Bookings user.

The example below shows an addin.json config file for the Outlook add-in server with MS Bookings enabled:

{
    "deploymentUrl": "https://domain.com/",
    "deploymentAddinEndpoint": "addin",
    "unbluOAuthBackendUrl": "https://domain.com/gateway",
    "clientId": "aaaaaaaa-aaaa-aaaa-aaaa-aaaaaaaaaaaa",
    "tenantIds": ["xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx", "yyyyyyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyyyyyyyyyy"],
    "syncServerEnabled": true,
    "syncServerAuthGatewayClientId": "bbbbbbbb-bbbb-bbbb-bbbb-bbbbbbbbbbbb",
    "syncServerSubscriptionExpiration": "36000000",
    "syncServerSubscriptionRenewalLimit": "72000000",
    "syncServerPollingCronInterval": "*/1 * * * *",
    "msBookingsEnabled": true,
    "msBookingsCalendars": [
    {
        "tenantId": "xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx",
        "smtpAddress": "abcdefg@domain.com",
        "userId": "wwwwwwww-wwww-wwww-wwww-wwwwwwwwwwww"
    }]
}

For more information, refer to Add-in ConfigMap in the documentation of the Unblu Outlook add-in.

Usage

Set up an MS Bookings calendar as described in the official documentation and connect to it by configuring

Synchronizing with Unblu

For information about synchronizing bookings with Unblu, refer to the Unblu Outlook add-in section on synchronizing with Unblu.