The Microsoft Exchange connector allows you to connect your non-Zendesk email servers, based on Microsoft Exchange, directly to your Zendesk Support instance. This is ideal for Microsoft customers looking to connect their online Microsoft 365 or Exchange servers and leverage their Exchange and Outlook workflows.
The main advantage of this solution is that it allows you to send and receive email traffic to and from your customers using your domain’s email services, while ensuring encrypted and secure relays to and from Zendesk.
Microsoft Exchange is the server powering all Microsoft email products, including Microsoft 365. Therefore, the Zendesk Microsoft Exchange connector is compatible with the online version of all Microsoft email products. The connector is incompatible with Exchange Server on-premises. If you're using on-premises servers, the SMTP connector may be a better option.
See Connecting your Microsoft Exchange account to Zendesk for more information on establishing and managing your connections.
This article includes the following topics:
Understanding how email is transmitted with the Exchange connector
Using an Exchange API, the Microsoft Exchange connector allows you to fetch email from an Exchange inbox and automatically convert email messages to tickets. The API is also leveraged to deliver outbound email from Zendesk to your Exchange mailbox.
Zendesk Support frequently checks for new email in your Exchange inbox. Only new, unread email messages in the inbox will be converted into tickets. Ticket notifications will be sent from your Microsoft email address.
Technical details
- The Exchange connector uses the Microsoft Graph API for communication with Microsoft.
- All communication between Zendesk and the Exchange server is conducted through HTTPS calls.
- The Exchange connector uses OAuth for authorization access.
- During authorization, you are granting access to Zendesk's verified Azure application.
- Zendesk will request only the essential permissions required for the operations of the Exchange connector.
- Credentials used to access your Exchange mailbox are securely stored and encrypted at rest.
Requirements
- The Zendesk Exchange connector is compatible with Microsoft Exchange Online only. Exchange Server on-premises versions are not supported.
- To connect your Exchange mailbox to Zendesk, you must be able to sign in (authenticate and authorize) as the account associated with that Exchange mailbox.
- The Microsoft email address cannot be used by any other connection method (such as email forwarding), agent, or end user in your Zendesk account.
- You must use OAuth to authenticate all Exchange API requests to Zendesk.
- You must set permissions on the Exchange mailbox to control who can access the mailbox and what actions they can perform.
- Your Exchange admin must have the ability to grant permissions to Zendesk during authorization.
Limitations
- Due to Microsoft API limitations, personalized email replies don't work with the Exchange connector. The Microsoft account configuration determines the sender name on outgoing emails sent from the Exchange server.
- Side conversations don't use the Exchange connector for communication.
- Due to requirements imposed by the Microsoft API, traffic through the Exchange connector has the following limitations.
- Limitations when sending email from Exchange:
- 10 emails per minute per mailbox
- 50MB per 5 minutes per mailbox
- 10,000 different email recipients in a 24-hour period per mailbox (shared across multiple applications connected to the mailbox)
- Limitations when fetching email from Exchange to Zendesk:
- 25 emails per minute per mailbox
- Max email size is 50MB (including attachments)
- Limitations when sending email from Exchange:
Understanding the email labeling system
The Microsoft Exchange connector is designed to help you efficiently manage your inbox by applying labels to inbound emails, allowing you to easily track their processing status. When emails are processed in Microsoft Exchange, the following labels are applied:
-
Zendesk: This label appears on all emails that have been processed by Zendesk. When only theZendesklabel is present, it means the email has been successfully imported into your Zendesk account. -
RejectedByZendesk: This label appears in addition to theZendesklabel when Zendesk couldn't import the email successfully. Emails tagged with both labels were processed but not imported into your Zendesk account.
When an email might be rejected
There are several common reasons why an email receives the RejectedByZendesk label:
- Email size limitations: Emails exceeding 50 MB cannot be processed. If your email contains large attachments, consider compressing or sharing the files through a cloud storage link instead.
-
Email format issues: Emails with improper formatting, corrupted content, or invalid structure might be rejected. Verify that all required fields, such as
FromandTo, are filled in. Additionally, ensure that the email body and any attachments are intact and properly uploaded.
Considerations regarding email headers
Email headers (such as To, From, CC, and Reply-To) contain important data and metadata about an email message.
Your administrator may want to change email headers for several reasons. However, it’s important to note that some header fields should never be altered since they are critical for ensuring the correct delivery and integrity of the message. Changing standard headers at the account's email domain before outbound sending is not supported. Any issues that emerge as a result of this should be investigated and corrected at the external domain.
The below headers should persist throughout the outbound relay process:
Auto-Submitted: auto-generated
X-Auto-Response-Suppress: All
X-Mailer: Zendesk Mailer
X-Zendesk-From-Account-Id: ******
X-Zendesk-Email-Id: ************************Changing your email header fields doesn’t change how Zendesk works; it only changes how you send your outbound messages and how you might receive responses. The relationships between the requester, agents, and CCs in the email and subsequent ticket should not change.