If you use Dynamics 365 for Sales for customer engagement, you can enjoy seamless integration in the lead-to-cash process by using Business Central for backend activities such as processing orders, managing inventory, and doing your finances.
This topic assumes that you are using the online versions of Business Central and Sales. You can mix online and on-premises versions, but that requires special configuration. For more information, see Preparing to Integrate to Dynamics 365 for Sales On-Premises.
Integrating the applications lets you access data in Sales from Business Central , and in some cases the other way around. You can work with and synchronize data that both services have in common, such as customers, contacts, and sales information, and keep the data up to date in both applications.
For example, a sales person in Sales can use the price lists from Business Central when they create a sales order. When they add the item to the sales order line in Sales, they can see the inventory level (availability) of the item from Business Central .
Conversely, order processors in Business Central can handle sales orders that are automatically or manually transferred from sales. For example, they can create and post sales order lines for items or resources that were entered in Sales as write-in products. For more information, see Handling Sales Order Data.
Business Central integrates only with Dynamics 365 for Sales. Other Dynamics 365 applications that change the standard workflow or data model in Sales, for example Project Service Automation, can break the integration between Business Central and Sales.
The assisted setup guide lets you choose the data to synchronize. Later, you can also set up synchronization for specific records. This is referred to as coupling. For example, you can couple a specific account in Sales with a specific customer in Business Central . This section describes what to take into consideration when you couple records.
For example, if you want to see accounts in Sales as customers in Business Central , you must couple the two types of records. To do that, on the Customers list page in Business Central , use the Set Up Coupling action. Then specify which Business Central customers to match to which accounts in Sales.
You can also create (and couple) an account in Sales based on, for example, customer record in Business Central using Create Account in Dynamics 365 for Sales, or vice versa, using Create Customer in Business Central .
When you set up coupling between two records, you can also manually request current record, for example a customer, to be overwritten immediately by account data from Sales (or from Business Central ) using Synchronize Now action. Synchronize Now action which will ask whether to overwrite Sales or Business Central record data.
In some cases you must couple certain sets of data before other sets of data, as shown in the following table.
| Data | What to couple first |
|---|---|
| Customers and accounts | Couple salespeople with Sales users |
| Items and resources | Couple units of measure with Sales unit groups |
| Items and resource prices | Couple customer price groups with Sales prices |
If your prices or customers use foreign currencies, make sure that you couple currencies to Sales transaction currencies.
In Sales, sales orders depend on information such as customers, units of measure, currencies, customer price groups, and items and/or resources. For the integration with sales orders to work you must couple customers, units of measure, currencies, customer price groups, and items and/or resources.
At the end of the assisted setup guide you can choose the Run Full Synchronization action to start synchronizing all Business Central records with all related records in Sales. On the Dynamics 365 for Sales Full Synch Review page, you choose the Start action. Fill synchronization can take some time to complete, but you can continue to work in Business Central while it runs in the background.
To check the progress of individual jobs in a full synchronization, on the Dynamics 365 for Sales Full Synch Review page choose an record to view details. To update the status during synchronization, refresh the page.
From the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Connection Setup page, you can get details about full synchronization at any time. From here, you can also open the Integration Table Mappings page to see details about the tables in Business Central and Sales that must be synchronized.
Sales orders that people submit in Dynamics 365 for Sales will be transferred to Business Central if you select the Automatically Create Sales Orders check box on the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Connection Setup page. Alternatively, you can manually convert submitted sales orders from Dynamics 365 for Sales by using the Create in Business Central action available on Sales Orders - Dynamics 365 for Sales page. On such sales orders, the Name field on the original order is transferred and mapped to the External Document Number field on the sales order in Business Central .
This can also work if the original sales order contains write-in products, meaning items or resources that are not registered in either app. In that case, you must fill in the Write-in Product Type and Write-in Product No. fields on the Sales & Receivables Setup page so that such non-registered product sales are mapped to a specified item/resource number for financial analysis.
If the description of the item on the original sales order is long, an additional sales order line of the type Comment is created to hold the full text on the sales order in Business Central .
Updates to sales order header fields, such as Last Shipment Date or Requested Delivery Date, that are mapped in SALESORDER-ORDER Integration table mapping are periodically synchronized to Dynamics 365 for Sales . Processes such as releasing a sales order and shipping or invoicing a sales order are posted to the sales order timeline in Dynamics 365 for Sales . For more information, see Introduction to activity feeds.
Sales quotes that are activated in Dynamics 365 for Sales will be transferred to Business Central if you select the Automatically Process Quotes check box on the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Connection Setup page. Alternatively, you can manually convert activated sales quotes from Dynamics 365 for Sales by using the Process in Business Central action on the Sales Quotes - Dynamics 365 for Sales page. On such sales quotes, the Name field on the original quote is transferred and mapped to the External Document Number field on the sales order in Business Central . Also Effective To field on quote is transferred and mapped to the Quote Valid Until field on sales quote in Business Central .
Sales quotes go through many revisions while they are being finalized. Both manual and automatic processing of sales quotes in Business Central ensures that previous versions of sales quotes are archived before processing new revisions of sales quotes from Dynamics 365 for Sales .
Preparing to Integrate to Dynamics 365 for Sales On-Premises
Relationship Management
Working with Business Central
Changing Which Features are Displayed
Managing Users and Permissions
Onboard your organization and users to Dynamics 365 (online)
© 2019 Microsoft. All rights reserved.