Reading Time: 10 minutes

Seven Pros and Cons of Microsoft’s Change to Default Office 365 Delegated Admin Privileges for Partners in the Partner Center

Name: Work 365
Price range: $

Microsoft has been making an investment and change in the CSP program. Some of these changes are program changes and technology changes to better align the channel.

Some of the recent changes include Advanced Support, Billing Automation, and Microsoft Cloud Agreements which we covered in our previous webinar and now Beginning November 1, Delegated Admin Privileges (DAP) are no longer automatically granted by default.

Prior to this change, all new relationships included Office 365 DAP, and the removal of DAP in Office 365 occurred after the reseller relationship was established. Now, when Partners use Partner Center to connect with customers, they must choose whether their customer relationship includes Office 365 DAP.

How to increase revenue in your cloud business?

5 quick tips to improve revenue with smarter and
efficient provisioning and subscription management

Microsoft CSPs Need Customer Self-Service Portals

How Do the Partner Center DAP Changes Affect the Customer’s Experience?

Instead of being directed to the Microsoft Office Admin Portal when accepting reseller relationship invitations, customers will now be directed to the Microsoft Store for Business.

Whether Partners choose to include Office 365 DAP for new customers will determine which communications and landing pages customers see in the Microsoft Store for Business.

Customers with DAP included: their invitation will mention DAP, and they will see a screen allowing them to accept DAP privileges as usual.
Customers without DAP included: DAP will NOT be mentioned in the invitation, and these customers will need to assign Partner permissions for managing Office 365 licensing and Azure to themselves.

Note: Work 365 Provider Configuration accommodates the scenarios where a partner can request specific relationships in the 1.8 release of Work 365.

How the Partner Center DAP Changes Will Affect Partner Reseller Customer Relationships

Pros:

Easier for Indirect CSPs: this change allows Indirect CSP Partners to send a “DAP-free” relationship, enabling a customer to purchase and the Partner to provision, but not have access to delegated admin.
More Flexible for Customers with Strict Compliance Requirements: Partners will not face compliance and/or security hurdles related to DAP access when working with highly regulated prospects, which means it may be easier to do business with those clients.
The Change is Optional: Partners that require DAP access in order to provide support to customers can continue to send reseller relationships with DAP. They will just need to verify the invitation settings.
Reduces Partner Conflict: Partner competition over Digital Partner of Record privileges (DPOR) can be resolved by the customer since they will have control over who they believe should be their DPOR.

Cons:

Quick Adjustment
This announcement was made 10 days before going into effect, leaving Partners little time to adjust to the new Partner Center process for sending reseller relationships.
Providing Support May Become More Complicated
If a Partner sends a “DAP-free” relationship to a customer and the customer later needs support, the customer will have to give DAP access to the Partner. This could lead to delays and confusion.
Reseller Support is Still Required
Even in “DAP-free” reseller relationships, this does not excuse a Partner from providing support. The MCA agreements have not changed, and resellers are still responsible for providing support.

Next Steps for Managing the Partner Center DAP Changes

Starting Nov. 1, 2018 Partners must choose whether to include DAP when establishing new reseller relationships using the Partner Center.
Make sure to send your invitations using the appropriate links.
Ensure you update existing documentation and collateral to reflect the new experience.

We will discuss these changes in our next Work 365 Webinar if you would like to learn more. Any additional information on this topic will be shared in our Work 365 Yammer Group.

Understand changes a Microsoft Partner needs to make to eliminate roadblocks and scale business growth.

Download eBook

Fresh from the Blog

Billing & Invoicing, CSP Management, Integrations, Payments

Why Recurring Billing in Business Central Still Falls Short for CSPs

Microsoft Business Central offers native Subscription Billing for recurring revenue, but for CSP partners, it’s only the start of the journey. window.location.href = "https://resources.work365apps.com/blog/business-central-csp-billing-au…

Featured Articles, Integrations, Subscription Management

Unlocking the Future of Promotion Management

Work 365 PV 2.0: Simplified Access, Smarter Billing, and Complete Visibility Licensing specialists and revenue leaders need more than just visibility, they need a seamless way to discover, apply, and manage promotions within their CSP management…

Billing & Invoicing, Integrations

ConnectWise + Work 365 – The Winning Combo to Sustain Business Profitably for MSPs

Previous Next