Overview
Provider Notifications allow sending interactive notifications to approvers in Microsoft Teams when an approval is created. Approvers can approve or reject directly from Teams in a single click, without navigating to ServiceNow.
Configuration Steps
Step 1: Create Provider Notification
Set the application scope to Microsoft Integrations - Core.
Navigate to: All → System Notifications → Provider → Notifications.
Click New.
Configure:
Name: Give Appropriate Name
Category: Microsoft Integrations
Step 2: Configure Trigger Conditions
Provider notifications can be triggered by event or record change.
Navigate to “When to send” tab.
Configure:
Table: Approval (sysapproval_approver)
Trigger: Record Change
Inserted: True
Condition: state = requested
This ensures notification is sent when approval is created.
Step 3: Configure Recipients
Navigate to “Who will receive” tab.
Configure:
Recipients: Approver
Save the record.
Step 4: Create Provider Content
Navigate to Contents related list.
Click New Provider Content.
Step 5: Select Notification Channel
An interceptor will appear to choose where the notification should be displayed.
Options:
Virtual Agent Content – Chat: Used to send notifications via ServiceNow bot in Microsoft Teams.
Virtual Agent Content – Messaging: Used for messaging apps like WhatsApp.
Workspace: Opens record in Workspace.
Next Experience: Opens record in native UI.
Select Virtual Agent Content – Chat.
Configure:
Name : Give appropriate name.
Step 6: Configure Format
Navigate to Format tab.
Available Types:
Record Card: Displays structured data in card format.
Simple: Plain chat message.
Image Card: Includes image and text.
Configure:
Type: Simple
Table: Approval (sysapproval_approver)
Step 7: Configure Message
Navigate to Message tab.
Enable Advanced checkbox.
Add the required script in the script field.
Refer to the Provider Notification code link for the script.
Provider Notification code link
Note
To send approval notifications with complete record details, there are certain limitations in Provider Notifications.
- In the Record Card format, only fields from the Approval (sysapproval_approver) table can be accessed.
- Fields from the actual task record (such as Change Request or RITM) cannot be accessed directly.
To overcome this limitation:
- One approach is to use a topic action with a “View Details” option.
- However, this requires users to first click View Details and then perform Approve/Reject, resulting in multiple clicks.
To enable a single-click approval experience:
- Use the Simple type in the Message tab.
- Enable the Advanced script option.
- Write a script to fetch and display required fields from the underlying task record directly in the notification.
Step 8: Select Channel
Navigate to Channels tab.
Select Microsoft Teams.
Save the record.
Step 9: Configure Actionable Buttons
Navigate to Actions related list.
9.1. Create Approve Button:
Click New.
Configure:
Name: Approve
Model Type: LLM- if NowAssist is enabled in virtual agent/NLU – if virtual agent is not enabled
Topic: Approve Sysapproval Approver
Active: True
Save the record.
9.2. Create Reject Button:
Click New.
Configure:
Name: Reject
Model Type: LLM- if NowAssist is enabled in virtual agent/NLU – if virtual agent is not enabled
Topic: Reject Sysapproval Approver
Active: True
Save the record.
Step 10: Link Actions to Provider Content
Scroll to Link Actions to Content related list.
Click New.
Configure:
Content: select the content you created previously.
Actions: Approve, Reject
Save the record.
.
Testing
Trigger the approval by changing the Normal Change Request state to Assess. Once triggered, an approval notification is sent to the approvers in Microsoft Teams along with the Change Request details.
Approvers can then approve or reject the request with a single click, without needing to log in to ServiceNow.
Regards,
Ajay Kumar Indla
