Dynamics 365 consulting FAQ: straight answers before you buy.

Business Central is Microsoft's ERP application for small and mid-sized companies. It covers finance, purchasing, sales, inventory, warehousing, projects and, in the Premium edition, manufacturing and service management. It grew out of Dynamics NAV and is now primarily sold as a cloud service.

No, but the cloud is where Microsoft puts its focus. Business Central online runs as a Microsoft-hosted service, and an on-premises version is still available for companies with a specific reason to host it themselves. Our comparison of cloud and on-premises sets out the trade-offs.

Microsoft ships two major release waves each year, in spring and fall, plus smaller monthly updates. Online customers are updated automatically within a window they can schedule. Extensions written the modern way survive these updates without rework in most cases.

Yes, and that is one of its strongest points for Microsoft 365 users. You can open customer and vendor records inside Outlook, edit lists in Excel and push them back, and share record links in Teams. Power BI and Power Automate connect to it through standard connectors.

Copilot is Microsoft's set of AI assistance features inside Business Central online. Examples include drafting item descriptions, suggesting bank reconciliation matches and helping with sales line entry. Which features you see depends on your region, language and the settings your administrator turns on.

Premium includes everything in Essentials plus manufacturing and service management. If you do not produce goods or run a service department with contracts and service orders, Essentials usually covers you. Our Essentials vs Premium page goes into the details. Microsoft also requires every full user in one tenant to hold the same edition, so the choice applies company-wide.

No. Team Members licenses give lighter access for people who mainly read data, approve documents or make limited edits. Full users are those who post transactions day to day. Getting this split right is one of the easiest ways to avoid overspending.

Microsoft sells Business Central subscriptions through its Cloud Solution Provider partners. Microsoft publishes current list prices on its Business Central pricing page, and they do change, so check there or ask for a CSP quote rather than relying on an old figure. We do not quote license prices on this site.

Yes. Microsoft offers a free trial of Business Central online with demo data. A trial shows the screens, but not your own processes until someone configures them. During discovery, we can walk your key users through the trial with one of your real processes, such as raising a purchase order and receiving the goods.

Usually, yes. Implementation services, any AppSource apps you add, third-party connectors and your own team's time all sit outside the Microsoft subscription. Our pricing page explains how we scope and quote the services part, which this Business Central FAQ leaves out.

It runs from discovery and a written scope through design, configuration, data migration, testing, training and go-live. Each phase ends with something you can check, such as a signed scope, a tested migration or a user acceptance sign-off. Our process page lists the deliverables phase by phase, in more depth than a Business Central FAQ allows.

Yes, through extensions written in Microsoft's AL language. Unlike older Dynamics NAV, the base code is not modified, which is why upgrades are far less painful. We look for standard features and AppSource apps first and only build where a genuine gap remains.

More than most buyers expect, especially from finance and whoever owns the data. Key users attend workshops, check migrated records and run acceptance tests. We agree those responsibilities in the scope so you can plan around them. Your finance lead and one person from operations are busiest during data mapping and testing, because they confirm the records.

Mostly remotely, with on-site days when they clearly help. Video workshops and screen sharing cover most of it. A warehouse walk-through or a room of users being trained are the typical reasons to travel. Any travel is agreed in the written scope with its purpose stated, so on-site days are planned from the start.

It handles sales tax through tax areas, groups and jurisdictions, and many companies add a tax calculation service for multi-state selling. It does not include a full US payroll engine. Most US companies keep their payroll provider and post payroll journals into Business Central.

Yes, and it is one of the most common moves we see. Customers, vendors, items, open invoices and opening balances transfer cleanly. Detailed transaction history is often kept in the old file or summarized, since bringing it all across rarely pays off.

Plan your move rather than wait for pressure. Microsoft has announced the end of GP's support lifecycle and provides migration tooling from GP to Business Central online. The work is less about the tool and more about deciding what to redesign versus carry over.

It can be either, depending on how heavily customized your NAV system is. A lightly modified NAV database can often move through Microsoft's upgrade path, while a heavily customized one usually benefits from a fresh setup with data brought across. We assess your code before recommending a route.

Usually less than you think. Open items, balances and a limited window of summarized history cover most reporting needs. Full detail can stay in an archive or read-only copy of the old system for audit questions. The more history you load, the more mapping and reconciliation the migration needs, so we set the window with your controller and auditor before any data moves.

We stay close through the first month end, which is where most questions surface. After that, clients can move to an ongoing support arrangement for questions, fixes, updates and small changes. It is a separate agreement, so you only take it if it suits you.

Senior consultants who do the work. The people in your discovery sessions are the people who configure and support the system, not a sales layer that hands off to someone else. That keeps context from getting lost between phases. You get named contacts at the start, including the consultant who leads your project and the person who handles support after go-live.

Our office is in Phoenix, Arizona, and most project work runs over video workshops and screen sharing. Arizona stays on Mountain Standard Time all year, and we schedule sessions and cutovers around your local business hours wherever you are. You can reach the office on +1 480 485 7373 during business hours, or email hello@d365consultant.com at any time.

Yes. We start with an honest assessment of where the project stands, what works and what needs redoing. Our page on rescuing stalled implementations describes that approach, since it needs more room than one Business Central FAQ answer. Before quoting any remaining work, we review the configuration, the open issues list and the original scope, so the new plan starts from facts.

Usually when it runs many legal entities across countries, needs deeper consolidation and budget control, or has finance processes that standard Business Central cannot meet with light extensions. Most small and mid-sized firms are well served by Business Central. Our Business Central vs Dynamics 365 Finance comparison walks through the signals.

It covers more complex manufacturing, planning, warehousing and transportation than Business Central, and it is normally licensed together with Finance. It suits companies with several plants or large warehouses whose planning rules outgrow Business Central's MRP. For a single-site manufacturer or distributor, Business Central is usually the better fit, and we say so when it is.

Yes. Both run on Dataverse, and Microsoft provides an integration that synchronizes customers, items, prices and orders with Business Central. The design work is deciding which system owns each record, so sales and finance stop editing the same data in two places.

Generally yes. The licenses are aimed at larger companies, and the projects involve more design work, more specialists and more testing. We quote every project against a written scope, so you can see what drives the difference. The scope also lists what each side does, so your own team's effort is part of the comparison.