Overview
In Dynamics 365 CE activities are tasks that users or teams perform when they contact customers, for example, making telephone calls, sending emails, taking notes or setting up appointments. Users can create activities for themselves, assign them to someone else, or can share them with other users or teams. An activity is any action which can be entered on a calendar and has time dimensions (start time, stop time, due date, and duration) that help determine when the action occurred or is to occur. Activities has some basic properties that help determine what action the activity represents, for example, subject and description.
The system automatically timestamps activities and shows who created/modified it. These details are available as part of the timeline on individual records.
The following commonly used activity types are available OOTB:
- Appointment
- Phone Call
- Task
- Note
Sample activity timeline view on an opportunity record:
Working with activities in Dynamics 365
An activity can be created via the activities option in the site map, or by clicking the + on an individual record timeline. This will open a quick create form that will capture activity information:
Once saved the quick create form will publish the activity on the record it is regarding:
The activity record can be opened to capture details of activity completion (e.g capturing a description of the phone call outcome), followed by activity closure. Capturing activity details and closing the record once complete enables users to track their activity progress. Upon closure of the record a status is captured which allows users to track the outcome of their activity. Once an activity has been completed, users can no longer reopen/edit that activity.
Working With Activity Priority and Statuses
The status of an activity is captured within the header of the activity record. The OOTB Activity types have the following OOTB status options that can be used during the activity lifecycle:
| Activity Type | Status Options |
| Appointment | Open, Completed, Cancelled, Scheduled |
| Sent, Cancelled, Pending Send, Sending, Failed, Draft | |
| Phone Call | Open, Completed, Cancelled |
| Task | Open, Completed, Cancelled |
| Note | N/A – status is not captured OOTB against notes |
When a user has completed their activity record and wishes to close the activity, the user can select from the following OOTB outcome statuses:
| Activity Type | Status Options | Status Options Selectable During Activity Closure |
| Appointment | Open, Completed, Cancelled, Scheduled | Completed, Cancelled |
| Sent, Cancelled, Pending Send, Sending, Failed, Draft | N/A | |
| Phone Call | Open, Completed, Cancelled | Completed, Cancelled, Made, Received |
| Task | Open, Completed, Cancelled | Completed, Cancelled |
| Note | N/A – status is not captured OOTB against notes | N/A – status is not captured OOTB against notes |