MS Exchange Calendar integration – overview and setup

After syncing your preferred calendar app with Scoro, you can add, modify and delete events and tasks in either of the applications – Scoro will keep everything in sync. Even so, Scoro should be used as the primary source for modifying and adding data. This way you can add more information to your events and get thorough reporting on all activities – break reports down by team member, client, project, and activity. Note! Recurring events need to be added from Scoro.

MS Exchange - Office  365 - Outlook

Integrating Scoro with MS Exchange/Office 365 lets you access your MS Exchange/Office 365 calendar events in Scoro and vice versa. You can add, modify, and delete events in either of the applications and Scoro will keep the data in sync. 

Quick setup – all users

To activate the integration go to Settings > Integrations > MS Exchange.

Click on the button Connect to MS Exchange.

You will be redirected to the MS Exchange login page. After a successful login (when logging in for the very first time) you’ll see a pop-up that enables you to allow MS Exchange and Scoro to sync data. To permit this, click Allow. 

Customize the following settings and save the changes:*
* Note that you may not be able to change some of the settings, such as data sync options and sync direction if your site admin has decided to manage these settings globally across the site.

• Data synced– decide, whether you wish to sync events, people, or both between Scoro and MS Exchange. For events, only the main calendar in your MS Exchange account will be synced.
• Direction– choose the direction of the events sync: should the events be synced both ways, only to Scoro, or from Scoro. In the case of two-way sync, the events can be accessed in both applications right after the first sync.
  People can be synced one way: from Scoro to MS Exchange.
• Primary source – primary source is always Scoro, regardless of the sync direction.
  By default, the primary source of sync is Scoro, meaning both new events added and existing events modified are synced from Scoro to Exchange. In case of any differences in information between the two apps, Scoro is used as the single source of truth, and the data in Exchange is updated accordingly (based on the primary source).
  Note! For one site, all users are recommended to use the same option for the primary source, when using two-way sync. For people, the primary source is always Scoro.
• Start date– select the start date. If you are activating this integration for the first time, you can choose whichever date you wish. All events and people added since that date will be synced.
• Send error notifications to – enter the email address to which Scoro will send error notifications in case something happens during data synchronization. You can enter only one email address in this field, so we recommend entering your site's administrator's email here. You can also see a list of all unresolved errors under the Logs tab in the integration settings.

If you cannot access MS Exchange under settings, ask your site admin to give users the right to set up this integration on the MS Exchange integration page. Only then can users connect their MS Exchange account and activate the sync.

Note! When syncing your personal events from MS Exchange to Scoro, make sure you mark the visibility of these events as Private in MS Exchange. Otherwise, all events are synced to Scoro as public, and the contents of the events are visible to everyone who has the right to see your calendar.

In case you need to update your Exchange username/password, use the Update credentials option. If the Exchange server has changed, please reach out to us via our contact form.

For Office 365 use the server outlook.office365.com.

Global settings – admins

Admin users can manage the Exchange Calendar sync and certain sync settings globally. To control the sync settings for all users across the site, navigate to the Global settings tab under Settings > Site settings > Integrations > MS Exchange.

Don’t forget to click the Save button when you make changes to global settings.

Sync options

• Enable sync globally – if this setting is enabled, the Exchange Calendar will be synced for all users who have their MS Exchange account connected. If you disable this setting, the sync will be disabled for all users. 
• Global sync direction – decide whether you want to enforce the same sync direction globally or let each user decide how they prefer it.
  • User preferences – every user can decide the sync direction under personal settings and toggle the event sync on/off. So if you are using global settings on your site, but would still like to give your users the power to decide whether they want to sync their connected calendars or not, set the sync direction to ‘User preferences’. This way, each user can toggle the event sync button on and off under their personal settings.
  • Two-way / from Scoro / to Scoro – the chosen sync direction will be enforced globally and users cannot change it individually. Users will not be able to disable the sync on an individual level.
• Default activity type - you can set a default activity type for events that are synced over from Google Calendar. This can be a big time-saver as it minimizes the need to add the activity type manually for each event in Scoro. 

Status mapping

Here, you can determine how the statuses match up in Scoro and Exchange. Scoro automatically maps as many of the statuses as it can recognize, but you should go over the settings, keeping in mind that:

1. Every external status needs to be mapped with a status in Scoro. It’s not possible to have any unassigned statuses.
2. We strongly recommend having a separate Scoro status for each external status. This is the easiest way to ensure that no data gets corrupted or overwritten when calendars start exchanging information back and forth.
3. If you do decide to map one Scoro status to several Exchange statuses, only the first one gets sent over to Exchange if your sync direction is either ‘two-way’ or ‘from Scoro’. For example, if you link both Out of office and Working elsewhere from Exchange with Out of office in Scoro, then any event that is set as ‘Out of office’ in Scoro would always sync to Exchange as ‘Out of office’, no events would sync as ‘Working elsewhere’. You can avoid this by simply creating a separate ‘Working elsewhere’ status on the Scoro side as well.
   

Domain aliases

If you’re managing any alias domains from a single MS Exchange account, you should list the aliases here. This helps you ensure that Scoro recognizes all users correctly when they get added to events with any of the aliases. 

If you do not use aliases at all, leave this section untouched. If you do use domain aliases, you should also add your primary email domain to this list. Add the aliases without the @ sign. We do not limit the number of aliases, so we recommend adding as many as needed to cover all possible scenarios and ensure clean data and minimize manual modifications.

• Example. Let’s say your employee Sophie Smith is using Scoro with her primary email address sophie.smith@domain1.com. She also has an alternate email sophie.smith@domain2.com set up, which she uses only for some very specific client communications. Now let’s suppose she gets added to an Exchange Calendar event as sophie.smith@domain2.com and that event is synced to Scoro. If you as a site admin have not set up domain aliases, Sophie will be listed under the event as a guest because Scoro doesn’t recognize her as a Scoro user due to the different domain. However, if you have listed domain2.com among the aliases, Scoro will recognize this alternate domain as well and identify Sophie for Sophie. This helps to ensure she’s always linked to events as Sophie, not a guest, no matter which email alias is used.

NB! Keep in mind that removing aliases can corrupt future data if some users are attached to future events with the alias that gets removed. We encourage you to consider all possible consequences before removing any aliases.

One-way or two-way sync?

One way sync

One-way sync is the perfect option if only one calendar is used for adding, updating, and removing events, regardless of whether it is done in Scoro or Exchange. In that case, there’s no need to worry about duplicate or missing data.

There are two options for one-way sync:

• From Scoro  - events created in Scoro are synced to Exchange.
• To Scoro - events created in Exchange are synced to Scoro.

Note! When using one-way sync and making changes in the other (not your main) calendar, this data is not synced back to the first app.

Two-way sync 

Two-way sync is a great way to keep everything up to date on both applications at the same time. Yet, there are a few things to keep in mind when setting up the MS Exchange integration with Scoro using two-way sync.

Benefits of two-way sync:

• You can use either calendar for adding, removing, or modifying events.
• You can be sure that your calendar is up to date, regardless of whether they check their calendar in Scoro or MS Exchange.

Things to know about the Exchange integration

• The event organizer is not a Scoro user or does not have an active integration between Scoro and Exchange. In that case, the user will be notified of this when updating the event. Also, if the event is first updated in Scoro, then the event updated again by the organizer, some of the data (like event description and date) will be overwritten, yet, for example, the list of participants is updated and all users added in Scoro will remain attached to the event. 
  
• Some of the Scoro users are not added as participants to the events. This is often caused by the fact that the Scoro user email and the Exchange account email are different. If the invite is sent to the Exchange account email and the participant does not have an active Exchange integration with Scoro, they will be attached to the event as a guest, not as a participant. However, if the email has the same firstname.lastname and the domain alias that comes after the @ sign is listed as domain aliases under the Global settings, Scoro can match that with the user.
  • Note! It does not affect users who have an active integration, even if the email addresses are different.
• Double notifications are sent to external participants. If the invite is sent from Scoro and the event is synchronized to Exchange, the external guest will receive an additional invitation from the Exchange calendar as well.
  • Note! Each time an update is synchronized from Scoro to Exchange, an invitation update is sent to all participants, except when adding or removing participants.
• Event organizer cannot attend the event. In a case where the event organizer cannot participate, the best approach would be to duplicate such an event without the original organizer as a participant. And the original event can be deleted by the creator. At the moment, MS Exchange doesn't have a feature that would allow delegating only one specific event to someone else.
  • Note! If the organizers remove themselves from an event in Scoro, the changes won't be synced to Microsoft Exchange as it would automatically delete the event for other participants in Microsoft Exchange.
• Events that are more than 48 hours in the past aren't synced or updated. If an event that has already taken place is created or updated, these changes will not be synced to the other calendar.
• Third-party Exchange calendars cannot be connected. As the calendar connection process requires logging in and granting access to that particular account, site users can connect only their own calendars.

Recommended Sync settings:
It is strongly recommended that the event synchronization is set up the same way for all Scoro users. The integration works best if the synchronization direction is set to two-way and the primary source is Scoro. Site administrators can easily set this up in the Global settings.

To avoid duplicates, it is recommended that all users use the same calendar integration, either Google Calendar or Exchange.

A user should not connect both calendars at the same time. This will result in a loop and cause an infinite amount of duplicates!