Configure Copilot to assist your service representatives
Copilot in Dynamics 365 Contact Center doesn't activate itself. You decide which capabilities to enable, which knowledge sources it can access, and how its responses are filtered and customized. These choices directly affect the quality of the assistance Copilot provides to service representatives.
Copilot configuration is split across two pages in Copilot Service admin center: Copilot for questions and email (under Support Experience > Productivity) handles the Ask a question and Write an email features, while Summaries is a separate page that controls conversation summary behavior.
Enable Copilot for service representatives
The first step is making Copilot available. Select Make Copilot available to representatives to enable the Ask a question tab in Copilot Service workspace. Until this setting is on, no Copilot features are visible to service representatives, regardless of what else you configure.
After enabling Copilot, you can configure specific capabilities individually, giving you control over which features are active for your teams.
Configure conversation summaries
Conversation summaries help service representatives quickly understand the context of an ongoing or recently transferred conversation. Instead of asking the customer to repeat themselves, the representative reads a Copilot-generated summary and picks up where the previous exchange left off.
On the Summaries page in the admin center, you can enable summaries for three trigger points:
- When a representative joins a conversation: Generates a summary automatically at the moment of transfer or when a second representative joins.
- When a conversation ends: Generates a post-conversation summary that remains accessible in the conversation record's Summary tab.
- On demand, by selecting a button: Representatives generate a summary at any point during the conversation by selecting Summarize conversation in the Copilot panel.
Tip
Enable all three triggers initially. Representatives value the on-join summary most in high-transfer environments, while the on-demand option gives them flexibility without requiring it.
Configure the Copilot help pane and knowledge sources
The Copilot help pane is the Ask a question experience—where representatives type questions and Copilot responds using your knowledge sources. The quality of Copilot's answers depends directly on what you configure as knowledge sources.
Internal knowledge base
Select Knowledge base to let Copilot search published Dynamics 365 knowledge articles. This is the most common starting point. Copilot uses the article content attribute to generate responses for Ask a question, Write an email, and Draft a chat response features.
For the knowledge base to produce good responses, your articles should be current, published, and written in the same language as the Copilot interface. Copilot refreshes the knowledge base content daily.
Trusted web domains
Select Add web address to add up to five trusted web domains. Copilot searches up to two levels deep within each domain when generating email responses. This option requires Bing Search to be enabled in the Power Platform admin center and is designed for public product documentation or support sites—not for authenticated internal systems.
Copilot Studio knowledge sources (preview)
For organizations that maintain knowledge in SharePoint, Dataverse, external websites, or enterprise data systems, you can connect those sources through Copilot Studio without importing everything into the Dynamics 365 knowledge base.
- Under Knowledge sources, select Use knowledge sources configured in Copilot Studio (preview). This opens Copilot Studio.
- In Copilot Studio, select Copilot in Dynamics 365 Customer Service.
- On the Knowledge page, select Add knowledge and choose a source type: public website, SharePoint, file upload, Dataverse, or enterprise data.
- Return to the Copilot Service admin center and select Save or Save and close.
- On the Publish knowledge sources dialog, select Publish.
Note
Knowledge sources added through Copilot Studio currently work with Ask a question only. They aren't available for Write an email response.
Add custom instructions
Custom instructions guide how Copilot generates responses when representatives use Ask a question. These instructions apply to all Copilot responses globally and can include:
- Tone and style preferences ("Respond in a friendly, professional tone.")
- Formatting guidance ("Use bullet points for lists.")
- Escalation guidance ("If no answer is available, advise the representative to escalate.")
- Organization-specific terminology or compliance reminders.
The Custom instructions field accepts up to 5,000 characters. Keep instructions concise and specific—vague instructions produce inconsistent results. Review Copilot responses regularly to confirm your instructions are producing the expected behavior.
Configure knowledge filters
Filters control which knowledge articles Copilot searches when responding to a question. Without filters, Copilot searches all published articles. With filters, you can scope results to match the context of the conversation.
Three filter types are available:
| Filter type | How it works | Visibility to representative |
|---|---|---|
| Preset filters | Applied in the background to all searches. Restrict results to a defined category. | Not visible |
| Representative filters | Representatives can see and toggle these filters in the Copilot panel to refine results. | Visible and selectable |
| Automated filters | Applied automatically based on the record the representative currently has open—for example, filtering by product when the conversation is linked to a specific product. | Optionally visible |
Automated filters are valuable because they adapt to context without requiring representative action. When a representative is handling a conversation about a specific product, Copilot automatically searches only articles tagged for that product—producing more relevant suggestions without any more effort.
Note
You can add up to five filters per filter category. Automated filters only work when the field value is populated on the current record.
With knowledge sources and filters in place, Copilot has the right information and the right scope to provide accurate, contextually appropriate assistance. In the next unit, you extend those capabilities further using plugins.