How to Relate an SLA Directly to a Case in CRM 2016

SLAs (Service Level Agreements) were introduced in Microsoft Dynamics 2013 SP1 (6.1). This robust feature lets you manage response and resolution commitments for your customers. CRM 2015 enhanced SLAs even further by providing the functionality to pause a case based on its status, and for recently released Dynamics CRM, you can now relate an SLA directly to a case. In today’s blog we will show you how to do this, so let’s get started!

Enhancements in CRM 2015 also included the ability to create new SLA KPIs in addition to “Respond By” and “Resolve By.” Scenarios might include a second response or determine how quickly a case is picked from a queue. Through all this, however, we were required to use Entitlements in order to create the relationship of a Case to its SLA. Entitlements provide significant functionality similar to legacy service contracts and, although robust, perhaps not always necessary.

In CRM 2016, we now have a direct relationship between Cases and SLAs. This allows for applying an SLA directly to a case via the new out-of-the-box relationship:

Now we can dynamically change the SLA based on metadata, related records, or changes to the case itself.

For example, if the case was escalated, we could change the SLA workflow, the Case creation details, routing rules, or business rules! The SLA could also be manually updated by a customer care user or manager.

Simply create a workflow to respond to the case change and update the SLA.

Note: An additional step may be required to update the related SLA KPI records.

With this enhancement, we are able to more efficiently handle changes in SLA requirements.