Azure AI integration

The absentify Teams Bot delivers absence notifications in Microsoft Teams. Day-to-day steps are in the Teams Bot guide. The assistant in the app answers how-to questions even when Azure AI is off. When Azure AI is on, the same assistant also runs in the Teams chat and can use live workspace data.

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What the Teams Bot does without Azure AI

The bot works as soon as a user has a linked Microsoft account and receives Teams notifications. Azure AI is not required for these actions:

• Instant Adaptive Cards in Microsoft Teams for leave requests, approvals, and representative requests
• Approve or Decline a request from the card (a decline asks for a reason)
• Accept or Decline a representative assignment from the card
• A welcome card when someone starts a chat with the bot, with links to absentify and the documentation

Users choose Email, Teams Notification, or Both under Notification settings. Teams messages only arrive when the Microsoft account is linked.

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What the assistant in the app does without Azure AI

The in-app assistant still answers from the documentation and can also look up your workspace plan and seats from live data. The reply includes links to those help articles and names the role, plan, or setting that applies. It answers in the language of the question. In the app, the reply can also list those articles under Sources:. Questions about your current plan, included features, seats, or upgrades are still answered from live workspace data, even when Azure AI is off. If you ask about your own absences or remaining days while Azure AI is off, the assistant adds a separate hint to enable Azure AI under Settings > Microsoft.

• Admins see: “To answer questions about your own data, like your absences or your remaining days, I need the Azure AI integration. You can switch it on under Settings > Microsoft > Azure AI integration.”
• Everyone else sees: “To answer questions about your own data, like your absences or your remaining days, I need the Azure AI integration. Ask your absentify admin to switch it on.”

If the documentation does not cover the question, the assistant says: “I couldn’t find this in our documentation. Please try asking it a different way, or write to support@absentify.com and a person will help you.”

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What Azure AI adds

When Azure AI is on, users can chat in Microsoft Teams or in the assistant in the app. Both use the same tools. The tools depend on the user’s role. How-to answers still include links to help articles and name the role, plan, or setting that applies. For all users:

• View their own absences
• View team absences they are allowed to see
• Check available leave types
• Check remaining allowance
• See their approvers
• Create or cancel a leave request
• Ask how a feature works

For users assigned as a representative:

• View pending representative requests
• Accept or decline representative coverage

For managers, admins, and approvers:

• View pending approvals
• Approve a request
• Decline a request with a reason

If Azure AI is off and someone messages the Teams Bot:

• Admins see a card that explains the feature and opens Settings > Microsoft
• Everyone else is asked to contact a workspace admin

Notification cards still work.

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Data handling and security

• With Azure AI off, absence and allowance data stay in absentify and are not sent to the model; documentation questions still use Azure OpenAI.
• What is sent when enabled: the user’s message, recent conversation turns, a short role context, and the tool results needed to answer (for example leave types, the user’s own absences, or whole documentation pages)
• Where it runs: processing stays in Microsoft Azure
• GDPR: processing follows GDPR

absentify covers the Azure AI usage cost. The feature remains Plus-only.

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Enable Azure AI

1. Confirm the workspace is on the Plus plan.
2. Go to Settings > Microsoft.
3. Turn on Azure AI integration.