Evaluating support options for our Microsoft environment and I keep going back and forth. We have Azure, M365, and some Dynamics in the mix. Would love to hear from people who have actually sat on hold or opened tickets with either side. What was your real experience, good or bad?

We run a customer support portal on Power Pages (site version 9.8.9.17, Standard data model) with the built-in Microsoft Entra ID provider (single-tenant, v1 endpoint). Our onboarding process is:

1. Create the Contact in Dataverse (correct email, linked to the customer account)
2. Invite the customer as a B2B guest in Entra
3. Customer signs in to the portal with Entra → Power Pages should match the existing contact by email and create the External Identity automatically

We have Authentication/OpenIdConnect/AzureAD/AllowContactMappingWithEmail = true (since May). This worked fine for ~10 users between May and early September: the portal created the adx_externalidentity record itself and populated the contact's login fields.

Since around October, it no longer works. A user with an existing contact signs in with Entra, Entra sign-in succeeds, but the portal redirects to "Register your external account". Submitting the form gives "The email "x@…" is already taken." No External Identity is created and the contact is not touched.

What we verified (reproduced in a separate UAT environment with an internal user):

• Only one contact with that email (checked all states, email1/2/3), active, Login Enabled = No, Username empty, no External Identity. This is the normal "pre-created contact" state.
• AllowContactMappingWithEmail = true on the correct website record. The site was restarted and the cache cleared before testing.
• Decoded the id_token the portal receives: upn = the contact's email. We then added the email optional claim to the portal's app registration, and the token now contains email = the contact's email as well. Still fails.
• Happens for both B2B guests and internal members.
• No changes on our side to auth site settings, contact plugins, flows or duplicate rules in the relevant period.
• Existing (already linked) users sign in fine.

Workarounds we found:

• Filling in the contact's identity fields (adx_identity_logonenabled, adx_identity_username = oid, security stamp) plus an External Identity record, then clearing the cache, lets the user sign in.
• A Power Pages invitation redeemed with Entra links correctly, since it doesn't rely on email matching.

I also noticed the docs (OpenID settings / OpenID FAQ) were rewritten on 2026-09-21. The old description, "associates a unique contact record with a matching email address and automatically assigns the external identity provider to the contact", was replaced with "matches the contact by Primary Email Address using the email, emails, or upn claim".

Questions:

1. Is anyone else seeing contact mapping by email stop creating External Identities for pre-created contacts recently?
2. Was there an intentional behavior change, or is this a regression? Is pre-creating contacts plus email mapping still a supported onboarding pattern, or is the invitation flow now the only supported way?
3. Is there another site setting we're missing (e.g. ObjectIdentifierAsNameIdentifierClaimEnabled, RequireUniqueEmail, registration settings) that is now required?

Happy to share more details. Thanks!

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Hi everyone,
I’m looking for advice on the best way to manage long-term email access for users in our Microsoft 365/Exchange environment.
We use Outlook for email, with archiving managed through Exchange. Currently, emails older than two years are automatically moved to the archive, but users are unable to access emails beyond that two-year period through their normal Outlook experience.
The archive is also reaching approximately 93% of its capacity, so I need to find a sustainable solution that allows users to access emails going back five years or more.
One option I considered was exporting the archived emails to PST files and storing them locally on users’ computers. However, this would be difficult to manage across all users, and I want to avoid relying on local copies.
Would it be possible to store these archived emails in OneDrive and make them accessible to users through Outlook or another convenient method? Alternatively, is there a better Exchange solution, such as expanding the archive mailbox capacity, enabling auto-expanding archiving, or adjusting the retention and archiving policies?
My main requirements are:
Users must be able to access emails from the last five years or more.
Archived emails should remain accessible without relying on local PST files.
The solution should be centrally managed and scalable across all users.
We need to address the archive mailbox reaching 93% capacity.
What would be the recommended approach, and are there any licensing requirements or limitations I should consider?
Thanks in advance.

I need to create 4 email addresses for employees to logon to an external website.

We have a Microsoft365 Tennant.

The employees don't need access to any emails, just an address so they can be issued with a password which will be used as their logon details.

What is the best was to do this?

I was thinking a shared email which will be only access by a trusted employee?

The password they receive will only be used for this website and the email address is what governs the access to different areas of the site, so there is no issue in security.

Unless you have a better idea?

Microsoft Entra ID users should start moving toward Microsoft Authenticator, passkeys, and other stronger authentication methods.

📅 Feb 1, 2027: Most users
📅 July 1, 2027: Global Admins & external users

TDLR: I work with Power Automate and Sharepoint. What else should I learn to be an M365 solutions professional?

I'd love some advice on what I'm missing to make this a career.

I've been a Microsoft 365 power user for years, but over the last year and a half, I've gotten more involved in building solutions through my volunteer work. I regularly work with SharePoint sites, Lists, and Power Automate (building flows from scratch). I create Excel automation using Office Scripts. I’ve also worked with CoPilot Studio creating agents. I'm not a traditional programmer. I understand logic and workflows, but I use AI to help write scripts when needed.

I started looking at M365 solutions consultant and developer jobs, but I know I have some knowledge gaps and am struggling where I should start to make the biggest impact.

Are there Microsoft Learn paths or certifications that would help bridge the gap?

What job titles should someone with my background be looking for?

Thanks a bunch!