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NCE products function differently when it comes to upgrades. This page explains what those differences are. Also, you will also find an analysis of how our Storefront portal allows the upgrade (full or partially) of an NCE subscription to both, an entirely new NCE subscription as well as an existing NCE subscription (source subscription) to another existing NCE subscription (destination subscription) that resides on the upgrade path of the source subscription.

Rules for Upgrading NCE Products

For the general rules on upgrading subscriptions, please see the page Upgrade/Downgrade a Subscription. Please note the following points when upgrading NCE subscriptions:

  • NCE subscriptions can only be upgraded. It is not possible to downgrade NCE subscriptions.

  • The upgrade paths for NCE products are created automatically when the Get Services Definition process runs.

  • Whether seat reassignment will happen automatically depends on the customer's eligibility. Please check for any notifications (explained in the section https://interworkscloud.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/ICPD/pages/628424705/Upgrading+NCE+Subscriptions#The-Upgrade-Process) or the Online Information tab, to ensure that seat reassignment has been successful or whether it must be done manually.

  • It is not possible to increase the quantity when upgrading. As a workaround, you may perform a full upgrade and increase the quantity afterward.

  • The promotion of the original product will be lost. If the target product has a promotion, the promotion will be applied after the upgrade.

  • It is not possible to set the upgrade to occur at a future date, it is only possible to upgrade on the current date.

  • The cancellation window of the upgraded subscription is the same as that of the original subscription.

  • It is possible to upgrade a subscription at any time, even while it is in its cancellation window.

  • Upgrading a Specialized Offer NCE subscription from a Specialized to a Standard is currently available. The reverse or any other upgrade combination is not yet available.

When Storefront users select an existing active (source) NCE subscription to upgrade, they are provided with a list of eligible (destination) NCE subscriptions to upgrade the source NCE subscription. A destination NCE subscription is considered eligible for an upgrade when it meets the aforementioned rules as well as the following, “Upgrade to an Existing Subscription”-specific rules:

It must:

  • Be active

  • Be non-trial

  • Have a product on the upgrade path of the source subscription’s product

  • Be out of the cancellation window period (meaning that the cancellation window has passed)

  • Have the same or larger term duration than the source subscription

  • Have an end date later than the end date of the source subscription’s

  • Exist in our platform

  • Exist under the same account with the source subscription

  • Follow certain MPNID rules depending on the account’s role

The billing frequency does not affect in any way the eligibility for the upgrade of a source NCE subscription to a destination NCE subscription.

When fully upgrading an NCE subscription, the external ID provided by Microsoft remains the same as the external ID of the original subscription.

Upgraded subscriptions normally have a new protected price, since they have a different cost & sell price. Also, the effective date, of when the price protection will be applied, should be taken into consideration. Furthermore, since the billing cycle of the upgraded subscription follows the billing cycle of the original one, the price protection effective date follows as well.

Upgrade Paths

The upgrade paths for NCE products are created automatically when the Get Services Definition process runs. The following figure is an example of possible upgrade paths for M365 - Office 365 E3 (New Commerce), retrieved by the Get Services Definition:

The Upgrade Process

Users of our portals (Storefront & BSS) can upgrade their NCE subscriptions by selecting the dedicated upgrade button from the respective portal, inside each existing active NCE subscription.

Upgrading an NCE Subscription from the Storefront

Resellers can upgrade their subscription(s) via the Storefront by selecting the dedicated upgrade button.
In the source subscription dashboard, select the I WANT TO… and then Upgrade the subscription.

UTE5.png


The Subscription Upgrade pop-up window displays all the available upgrade options, in a carousel fashion. You can navigate to all the upgrade options with the left and right (blue) arrows.

UTE6.png

When a product is selected, the eligibility check runs to check whether the specific subscription can be upgraded.

  • If the product is eligible, the process can continue as analyzed below.

  • If the product is not eligible, an error message is displayed, stating <NCE product>: Could not find eligible upgrades for this combination of customer/subscription.

    UTE8.png

After selecting the eligible product to upgrade to, the following pop-up window is displayed where you have two main options for the upgrade. You can select to (check the two tabs below for the analysis of each option):

UTE0.png

  1. Upgrade to a New Subscription: In this case, the eligible product that you have selected for the upgrade in the previous step will create an entirely new subscription. Of course, the upgrade can be either full or partial.

  2. Upgrade to an Existing Subscription: In this case, the eligible product you have selected for the upgrade in the previous step can be matched to an existing subscription having the same product, so that the existing source subscription along with its licenses can be upgraded (fully or partially) to the existing destination subscription.

Upgrading an NCE Subscription from the BSS Portal

BSS users can upgrade subscription(s) via the BSS portal by selecting the dedicated upgrade button, from inside the view page of an NCE Susbcription.
By selecting the Upgrade button, all the available upgrade options appear in the Upgrade Product drop-down menu as retrieved by the Get Services Definition process, regardless of eligibility. The BSS user has the option (depending on the Quantity number of licenses) to proceed with a full or partial upgrade towards a new NCE subscription.

  • When a product is selected, the eligibility check runs to check whether the specific subscription can be upgraded to.

    • If the product is eligible, the process can continue as shown on the page Upgrade/Downgrade a Subscription.

    • If the product is not eligible, an error message is displayed, stating <NCE product>: Could not find eligible upgrades for this combination of customer/subscription.

Currently, the “Upgrade to an Existing Subscription” feature is not available to the BSS portal but in future releases it will be.

Upgrading an Annual NCE Subscription with Installments in BSS

Since the scenarios of upgrading a monthly or annual NCE subscription are fully supported in Storefront, in this section, we analyze the upgrade of an annual NCE subscription with a monthly payment plan (installments) from the BSS.

The BSS user can fully or partially upgrade an annual NCE subscription that has a monthly payment billing plan by clicking on the Upgrade button located inside the Subscription view page under the Shortcuts menu.

During the execution of an upgrade from the BSS platform, the following events happen to the existing annual NCE subscription with a monthly payment plan:

Full Upgrade

Partial Upgrade

  • A new installment plan is created on the existing subscription for the upgraded product.

    • The first installment’s Start Date is the subscription’s (new) Start Date.

    • The last installment’s End Date is the subscription’s End Date.

    • If the upgrade happens midterm (e.g. sometime during the 3rd month of a 12 month plan) then the new Installment Plan will have only 10 installments and the first installment will have a prorated charge according to the Billing Period.

  • The initial installment plan of the subscription will be canceled and:

    • the Credit invoice for the decreased quantity will be generated from the Billing Service.

    • will have all pending (not invoiced) installments canceled.

  • The existing subscription keeps the same Subscription ID and the same End Date.

  • The existing subscription changes the Start Date, the Product ID, and all its prices (initial/final/cost/protected/ etc.).

  • A new Subscription with a new Installment Plan is created for the upgraded product.

    • The first installment’s Start Date is the new subscription’s Start Date.

    • The last installment’s End Date is the new subscription’s End Date.

    • If the upgrade happens midterm (e.g. sometime during the 3rd month of a 12 month plan) then the new Installment Plan will have only 10 installments and the first installment will have a prorated charge according to the Billing Period.

  • The existing Subscription experiences a quantity decrease with a prorated refund calculated for the licenses that were upgraded.

  • The Credit invoice for the decreased quantity is generated automatically.

Viewing NCE Subscription Upgrade Activity

The Online Information tab appears in the subscription view and contains the upgrade logs for NCE subscriptions. The data is retrieved from the Microsoft Partner Center.

The table contains the following columns:

  • Date - The date of the activity

  • Activity - The type of activity (conversion/seat reassignment)

  • Activity From - The initial Product

  • Activity To - The target Product

  • Quantity - The quantity which is transitioned

  • Activity Status - The stage the activity is at (Started/Completed/Failed)

Notifications

NCE Upgrade Notification

A notification called NCE Subscription Upgrade is sent to the email of BSS user and their contact when an upgrade of an NCE subscription has started, with the following contents:

Subject:

Upgrade subscription {#Leases.Name#} with quantity {#Leases.Quantity#}

Body:

New Commerce Subscription {#Leases.Name#} upgrade has started. For more information, please contact your system administrator.“

 It is a known issue that this notification is not dispatched when the subscription is upgraded via the Storefront. 

Seat Reassignment Notification

A notification called NCE Subscription Upgrade Seat Reassignment Required is sent to the BSS account and their contact when manual seat reassignment is required, in the following 2 cases:

  1. For a full upgrade, when automatic seat reassignment fails

  2. For a partial upgrade

In the second case, the email is sent for both subscriptions, the original and the upgraded subscription.

The notification has the following contents:

Subject:

Upgrade subscription {#Leases.Name#} with quantity {#Leases.Quantity#}

Body:

Upgrade of subscription {#Leases.Name#} completed.

Manual seat reassignment is required!

For more information, please contact your system administrator.“

Possible Error Scenarios

During the upgrade process, it is possible to encounter one of the following messages:

  • When a subscription upgrade is in progress, no other subscription change is allowed. If during this time a change of the subscription licenses occurs, an error message will be displayed in the BSS and Storefront platforms respectively.

    image-20240508-090800.png

  • This New Commerce Experience Subscription is not eligible for Upgrade. – Displayed when the subscription is not eligible for an upgrade. The subscription may fail an eligibility check run by Microsoft, even if the upgrade appears to be available on the side of the client.

  • Subscription quantity change is not available due to SKU mismatch between BSS and Microsoft Partner Center. – Displayed when an upgrade fails, and the BSS user attempts to change the quantity of the NCE subscription. This results in MS executing the latest available update action on the existing NCE subscription rather than the actual upgrade.

  • In case of a scheduled change/manage renewal on the Source subscription, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because a renewal change is scheduled for the Source subscription. Please cancel the scheduled renewal change request and then try again.”

  • In case of a scheduled change/manage renewal on the Destination subscription, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because a renewal change is scheduled for the Destination subscription. Please cancel the scheduled renewal change request and then try again.”

  • When the Source Subscription has a restriction on the minimum quantity and the upgrade it would result in a destination subscription with fewer licenses than the minimum allowed, the following error message appears: “Product <Product Name of Source Subscription> supports quantity range between <min quantity> and <max quantity>.”

  • When the Destination Subscription has a restriction on the maximum licenses' quantity and the upgrade is going to increase the licenses more than the maximum allowed, the following error message appears: “Product <Product Name of Destination Subscription> supports quantity range between <min quantity> and <max quantity>.”

  • When the source subscription is not active inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the source subscription is not active in MPC.”

  • When the destination subscription is not active inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the destination subscription is not active in MPC.”

  • When the SKU (product) of the source subscription has been changed inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the SKU of the source subscription in MPC has been changed.”

  • When the SKU (product) of the destination subscription has been changed inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the SKU of the destination subscription in MPC has been changed.”

  • When the MPNID of the source subscription has been changed inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the MPNID of the source subscription in MPC has been changed.”

  • When the MPNID of the destination subscription has been changed inside the Microsoft Partner Center, the following error message appears: “The upgrade cannot be performed because the MPNID of the destination subscription in MPC has been changed.”

Rare Cases of Error Messages Concerning the “Upgrade to an Existing Subscription“ feature:

  • The upgrade cannot be performed due to license discrepancies between the platform and MPC. Please contact your CSP.

  • The upgrade cannot be performed due to a technical error. Please contact your CSP.

  • The upgrade cannot be performed due to an invalid upgrade license quantity.

  • Upgrades from standard to specialized offers are not permitted.


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