Is it feasible to map HTML with to the String field -??

[sameekshasa]

I would like to confirm whether it is possible to copy the complete body of an inbound email to the Incident Description (OOB String field type) field when creating an Incident through Flow Designer.

The inbound email body contains both plain text and HTML tables, and the requirement is to preserve and populate the content in the Incident Description exactly as it appears in the email.

Could you please confirm if this is supported through Flow Designer? If not, what alternative solution would you recommend to ensure the original email content, including the table formatting, is accessible from the Incident?

Thanks in Advance!

[Rafael Batistot]

Hi @sameekshasa 

The Description field is a String field, which does not render HTML tables with their original formatting.

A possible solution would be to create a custom HTML field to store and display the email body, including its tables and formatting. You would then need to populate this field with the original HTML content using Flow Designer or a server-side script.

[sameekshasa]

Hi @Rafael Batistot ,

Thanks for your prompt response. We would prefer not to implement this using a custom field. Instead, would it be possible to copy the complete original email and associate it with the Incident created through Flow Designer?

If this is feasible, could you please advise how it can be achieved? I have already tried creating an attachment from the email body and attaching it to the Incident, but unfortunately that approach did not work.

Any suggestions or alternative approaches would be greatly appreciated. 😊

[rajihuj]

This is possible if plain-text content is sufficient, but the Incident Description field is a string field, not a rich-text HTML field. A Flow Designer flow can populate it with the inbound email’s body text, but it won’t preserve HTML table formatting as a rendered table. At best, the table may appear as plain text; copying the raw HTML into Description would store markup, not make the field display it as a formatted table.

For a basic setup:

In Flow Designer, create a flow with an inbound-email trigger, if that trigger is available in your instance and release.
Add Create Record for the Incident table.
Map the email subject to Short description and the trigger’s plain-text body value to Description.
Test with messages containing both plain text and HTML tables. Check the resulting record and confirm what the trigger actually exposes—the available data pills can vary by configuration and release.
If you need the original formatting, I’d avoid treating Description as the archive for the email. A more dependable approach is to keep the received email available on the instance and link it to the Incident—for example, by creating the Incident in an inbound email action and associating the email record with it. ServiceNow’s inbound email examples use email.body_text when setting a record’s description, and describe inbound actions as parsing the email and creating or updating records.

If users need to read formatted content directly on the Incident, consider a dedicated HTML-capable field or a related record that stores the email content, then test how HTML is sanitized and displayed in your instance. Keep the original email linked as the source of truth, since email clients may generate different HTML for the same message.

[Ankur Bawiskar]

@sameekshasa 

not possible as string field won't render HTML tags

why not add that email body content to work_notes which supports HTML?

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