The Business Central Sales Order Agent is Microsoft’s built-in AI agent that turns customer emails into sales quotes and orders in Business Central. We think it suits short email orders from known contacts, with a person approving each reply. Lleverage fits when orders arrive as spreadsheets and long PDFs, follow rules per customer, or outgrow one approval per reply.
What is the Business Central Sales Order Agent?
The Sales Order Agent is an AI agent that Microsoft builds into Dynamics 365 Business Central. It watches one Microsoft 365 mailbox, reads customer emails that ask for items, finds the customer and the items, checks availability and replies with a sales quote or a sales order as a PDF. Microsoft lists it as generally available on the Copilot & agent capabilities page and bills it in Copilot Credits.
The agent works the way a user does. It starts from a Role Center, opens pages, fills in fields and runs actions, guided by instructions in natural language and by the captions and tooltips on each page. It runs as its own Business Central user, with the SOA - EDIT permission set by default, so every record it touches carries its user ID. We read Microsoft Learn’s 4 pages on the agent (overview, set-up, process and FAQ) on 5 October 2026, and every statement about it on this page comes from them.
What can the Sales Order Agent do, and where does it stop?
Within its scope it does a lot. A relevance model drops emails that are not requests, such as offers to sell, and skips attachments like terms and conditions. Items are found in 3 layers: an exact match on item number, vendor item number, GTIN or item reference first, then item attributes such as colour or size, then a fuzzy search across the catalogue, item translations and extended text included. Availability is checked against the requested date and location, and with capable-to-promise switched on the agent calculates the earliest shipment date for items not in stock. One company can run several agents, each with its own mailbox, folder and settings.
Its limits are written down just as clearly. The agent always creates a sales quote first, even when the customer asks for an order. A Business Central user reviews every outgoing email. The customer is identified only by matching the sender’s address to the E-Mail field on a contact card, so a forwarded email is matched to the colleague who forwarded it. The agent handles sales lines of type Item only, up to 15 per document, leaves the Variant Code empty and creates no new items, contacts or customers. Requests to change prices or discounts go to a user. Its instructions sit in Microsoft’s code: adjusting them is not supported, and partners cannot extend the agent.
How is Lleverage different?
Lleverage is an AI agent that works the order inbox next to Business Central and creates the sales order through the Business Central API. It reads email bodies, PDFs, Excel and CSV files and portal exports, takes the customer details and the delivery address from the order itself, and checks items, availability and price before anything is written. Quotes are a separate flow: the agent drafts them from the request, and your team reviews and sends.
Where a person steps in is yours to decide. One confidence line sets which orders go in on their own and which wait. Every check, from price against contract to part numbers, credit and addresses, has its own setting, and a change takes effect on the next order, logged with who made it. Your customers’ habits become rules: Xpol runs 25 customer rulesets for unit conversions, weekday label text and depot splits, and at Topa the agent drafts the reply when a commission number is missing. Exceptions reach the person who settles them, with the reason attached.
Forward deployed engineers build the first flow with your order desk, and the first process typically runs supervised within a few weeks. More in Control, which covers thresholds, approvals and the audit trail, and on pricing.
Business Central Sales Order Agent vs Lleverage, side by side
The table sets the Sales Order Agent next to Lleverage on the points that decide a choice. The middle column comes from Microsoft Learn, read on 5 October 2026, and the first row is where the built-in agent is stronger. Our Business Central order page compares file formats, languages and order length.
| Sales Order Agent (Microsoft) | Lleverage | |
|---|---|---|
| Getting started | Stronger here. Built into Business Central and generally available: turn it on, pick a mailbox and folder, add users. A Try it out page tests it on your own items. | Forward deployed engineers connect Business Central and build the first flow with your order desk. The first process typically runs supervised within a few weeks. |
| From request to order | Always creates a sales quote first. It becomes a sales order after the customer confirms by email, or straight away when Send quotes for confirmation is off and Make orders from quotes is on. | Creates the sales order in Business Central through its API. Quotes are a separate flow that the agent drafts and your team reviews and sends. |
| Who signs off | A user approves every outgoing email. By default a user also reviews the first message of each conversation from known senders, and every message from unknown ones. | One confidence line: above it a sales order is created and confirmed on its own, below it a person looks first. |
| Recognising the customer | Only by the sender’s address in the E-Mail field of a contact card. A forwarded email is matched to whoever forwarded it, and a user links the right customer by hand. | Reads the customer details and the delivery address from the order itself, as the agent at Topa does for about 700 customers. |
| Your own rules | Instructions are set in the agent’s code and not visible to users. Adjusting them is not supported and partners cannot extend it. Custom fields work, with results that vary. | Every check has its own setting, and rules per customer are added as you go. Xpol runs 25 rulesets for units, label text and depot splits. |
| Left to a person | New items, contacts and customers, lines other than type Item, variant codes, price and discount requests, and changes to a sales order once it exists. | Unknown article codes and orders below the confidence line, with the reason attached. At Topa the agent also drafts the reply when a commission number is missing. |
| Volume and cost | Copilot Credits by the complexity of each interaction, and a daily email limit, 100 by default. When credits run out it stops reading new email and works through the backlog once they return. | One monthly price per agent, with integration and AI usage within fair use. No seats and no usage bills. |
| Where it runs | Inside Business Central, with a Microsoft 365 mailbox as the only way in. On-premises Business Central and Navision: not described on the vendor’s pages. | Business Central online, on your own servers or Navision, reached without opening them to the internet, plus the Outlook, Gmail, Teams or Slack your team uses. |
| Fits best when | Orders are short emails from contacts on file, customers like a quote first, and someone approves each reply inside Business Central. | Orders come as files from senders of every kind, follow rules per customer, or should be confirmed without a person approving each email. |
When is the Sales Order Agent enough?
We think the built-in agent is the right choice if most orders are short emails from contacts whose address is on file, in a language Microsoft has validated, and someone on the order desk can approve each reply. It is already in Business Central, needs no integration project, and keeps every task on a timeline your team can inspect, with the agent’s reasoning and citations. Its quote-first flow also suits a business whose customers want a quote before they commit.
It is easy to try. The set-up page has a Try it out section that runs a task on a sample message, or on a sample purchase order built from your own items, without sending an email. If that test looks like your real order desk, start there.
When do you need more than the built-in agent?
We think an AI agent like Lleverage is the better fit in these cases:
- Orders arrive as Excel or CSV files and portal exports, which are not among the agent’s attachment types (PDF, PNG and JPG).
- Orders run past 15 lines, or carry variants, charges or resources next to items.
- Customers order through buyers, assistants or shared addresses that are not on a contact card, so the sender is not the customer.
- Your desk works to rules per customer, such as unit conversions, label text or depot splits, that a fixed set of instructions cannot hold.
- Confirmations should go back without anyone approving each email, so the desk only sees the exceptions.
- Part of the group runs Business Central on its own servers or still on Navision, which Microsoft’s pages for the agent do not describe.
Topa went this way with orders from about 700 customers in every format, and more than 90% now go into Business Central without manual input. Our comparison of Copilot Studio and Lleverage covers building your own agent on Microsoft’s stack, and our list of Copilot Studio alternatives sets out the other options.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Business Central Sales Order Agent cost?
Microsoft bills it in Copilot Credits, charged by the complexity of each interaction, once billing is set up for the environment. When credits run out the agent stops reading new emails, then works through the backlog when credits return, so Microsoft suggests a daily email limit. Lleverage is one monthly price per agent, with no usage bills.
Which languages does the Sales Order Agent support?
Microsoft has validated it in Danish, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil) and Spanish, and says other languages might not work as intended. Dutch is not on the list, and mixed language input can lower the quality. Lleverage runs on orders from French, Swiss and Dutch retailers at Xpol and from customers across the Netherlands at Topa.
Does the Sales Order Agent read PDF and Excel attachments?
It reads PDF, PNG and JPG attachments when Analyze attachments is on. A PDF can have up to 50 pages and 20 MB, and all attachments in one email share a limit of about 150,000 characters. Excel and CSV are not listed. Lleverage reads email bodies, PDFs, Excel and CSV files and portal exports from the same inbox.
Can the Sales Order Agent create orders without a quote?
Not quite. It always creates a sales quote first, because a quote has no effect on planning, reservations or availability. With Send quotes for confirmation off and Make orders from quotes on, it converts that quote into a sales order straight away, and the customer only sees the order. A user still approves the outgoing email.
Can Lleverage and the Sales Order Agent run side by side?
Yes, if each has its own inbox. The Sales Order Agent works through every email in the folder it monitors, so we would point it at one mailbox or folder, for example short email orders from known contacts, and let Lleverage work another with the files and long orders. Both create sales orders in the same Business Central.
What about purchase invoices and the Payables Agent?
The Payables Agent is Microsoft’s separate agent for vendor invoices. It reads PDF invoices from its own mailbox and drafts a purchase invoice for review, and Microsoft has validated it in English only. Microsoft warns that sharing its mailbox with the Sales Order Agent can cause conflicts. Lleverage handles supplier invoices with its own agent, described under AP automation.