Microsoft Teams Virtual Agent and Employee Center

[newuser2]

Hi community, 

Our customer has been successfully using the VA from Teams in the previous release. We followed the integration process and requested the app from the Teams app store, aligning with @Victor 's article: Link.

Everything was working smoothly until the customer recently requested to embed Employee Center into the VA for the Vancouver release. 

We've extensively reviewed ServiceNow documentation, and most recommendations point towards uploading the manifest. However, our previous setup didn't involve using a manifest. Instead, the app was simply requested from the Teams app store, and the branding was customised in the Teams Admin Center portal.

I have couple questions:

1. Is there a way for us to embed Employee Center without using the manifest and continue seamlessly from our current configuration?
2. Alternatively, if using the manifest is necessary, does this mean a new Virtual Agent app will be installed in Teams? (No longer using the current VA)
3. Will the topics designed for our current virtual agent picked up to the new app? 

I have attached the OOTB looks of the Teams VA which is similar to the customer setup (except the designed topic)

Your guidance on this matter would be greatly appreciated.

[Chris D · Accepted solution]

We switched off the old "Now Virtual Agent" app awhile ago and it sounds like it's time for you to do so as well. I don't think that old app supports embedding a Portal (technically not just the Employee Center).

The new Teams app is called "ServiceNow for Teams" and you can get access to it via the IT Service Management for Microsoft 365 via the ServiceNow Store - then you follow the directions in the documentation you referred to (configure the app manifest, export it, upload to Teams, etc.).

As far as your questions specifically:

1. No - as mentioned, I don't believe the Now Virtual Agent app supports embedding portals. Even if it did support it, you'd have to update the app manifest and reupload/reinstall the Teams app - you might as well move to the latest replacement app at this point which is easier to configure and has more features.
2. Yes, the new app is ServiceNow for Teams, though you can easily rename it for end users as part of its configuration. It's not a different VA though (if that's what you mean by "no longer using the current VA")...
3. Yes, it's still using the same ServiceNow Virtual Agent. The only functional difference is if you have any scripts that check for the conversation's Device Type; the old app used "teams" (label: "Microsoft Teams (Deprecated)") while the new app uses "Teams" (label: "Teams") - therefore if you're doing a string comparison, ensure that you check both capital- and lowercase-T's. All the topics otherwise work the same.