Migrate from Dynamics 365 Customer Service to Zendesk

Dynamics 365 Case records map to Zendesk Tickets. We map case.title to Ticket subject, case.description to the first public comment, case.statecode/statuscode to Ticket status (Open, Pending, Solved, Closed), case.prioritycode to Ticket priority (Low, Normal, High, Urgent), case.customerid to Zendesk User or Organization, and case.ownerid to Ticket assignee. Custom incident columns migrate as Zendesk custom ticket fields. The primary risk is flattening the relational activity tree: all Dynamics Activities attached to a Case become Zendesk ticket comments in chronological order with the original Activity type embedded as comment metadata.

Dynamics CE Contact records map to Zendesk Users. We map contact.fullname to User name, contact.emailaddress1 to User email (used as the dedupe key), contact.telephone1 to User phone, and contact.address1_composite to User address fields. Contact is migrated after Organization because Zendesk Users reference an Organization as a required field on the end-user side. If the source Contact lacks an email, we generate a placeholder and flag the record for admin verification.

Dynamics Account records map to Zendesk Organizations. We map account.name to Organization name, account.website to Organization domain (used for dedupe and auto-association), and account.address1_composite to Organization address. Account is migrated before Contact because Zendesk Users require an Organization lookup. If the source Account has child Contacts, all child Contact records are held until the parent Account insert completes and the Organization ID is available.

Dynamics Knowledge Articles migrate to Zendesk Help Center Articles within the designated Section and Category. We map article.title to article title, article.articlebody (HTML) to article body, article.msdyn_locale to article language, article.status to publish status (Draft, Published, Archived), and article.msdyn_primaryauthor to article author. HTML content is pre-validated because Zendesk Help Center renders a different HTML subset than Dynamics. The article URL structure changes after migration; we produce a redirect map for the customer's web team.

Dynamics Queues holding Cases and Activities map to Zendesk Views. Queue name becomes View name, and Queue members map to View restrictions by agent group. We preserve the queue type (Public/Private) as a View sharing setting. However, Dynamics Unified Routing decision tables and skill-based assignment logic have no Zendesk equivalent and are documented separately as a routing-rebuild requirement.

Dynamics Entitlements representing support contracts with allocated hours, case count limits, channel restrictions, and SLA linkage map partially to Zendesk SLA Policies. We migrate entitlement.name as the SLA policy name, entitlement.totalterm as the entitlement terms summary, and entitlement.budgettype (hours vs case count) as Zendesk SLA target metrics. Channel restrictions and per-entitlement pause conditions do not map because Zendesk SLA policies lack pause-condition logic; these are flagged for manual rebuild.

Dynamics SLA KPI targets (first response time, resolution time), business hours, and warning thresholds map to Zendesk Business Hours configurations and SLA Policy targets. Pause conditions in the source SLA definition have no Zendesk equivalent and are noted as a gap. Active SLA instances on open Cases migrate as Zendesk SLA Policy assignments on those Tickets.

Dynamics polymorphic Activities (Email, Phone Call, Task, Appointment) attached to a Case via regardingobjectid merge into the target Zendesk Ticket as sequential comments. We preserve the original Activity type as a comment metadata tag (e.g., [Dynamics Email], [Dynamics Phone Call]) and the Activity party's email address, call duration, and disposition where present. Activity ordering is maintained by setting the comment timestamp to the original Dynamics Activity createdon value.

Dynamics Notes (annotation table) and File column attachments attached to Cases or Contacts migrate as Zendesk Ticket or User attachments. We retrieve the file blob via the Dataverse file download endpoint, chunk large files by Zendesk's 20 MB per-request limit, and attach them to the target Ticket or User record. Attachments stored in SharePoint require re-upload to Zendesk's native file storage or a configured Zendesk connected Dropbox/Google Drive integration.

Dynamics Omnichannel chat, voice, SMS, and social session transcripts map to Zendesk Ticket comments as text. We export the session.starttime, session.channel, session.queue, and message body with sender role (agent/customer/system). Voice call recordings and social media attachments do not migrate because Zendesk stores media differently; we produce a separate inventory of channel assets that require re-link or re-upload to Zendesk's media storage.

Custom tables and columns added by the customer to Dataverse require a pre-migration schema inventory. We classify each custom table: lookup tables pointing to Contact or Account map to Zendesk Organization fields or User fields; transactional custom tables map to Zendesk custom ticket fields with equivalent type (string, integer, datetime, option-set, boolean). Option-set values are enumerated as Zendesk custom field dropdown options. Tables with no clear Zendesk equivalent are flagged as candidates for Zendesk Explore reporting or a custom database outside the ticket model.