Microsoft 365 outage: what your business should do now
Email isn't arriving, calendars aren't working and staff are asking what to do. You can't fix a Microsoft 365 outage yourself, but you do decide how your organisation gets through the hours until recovery. This is a practical plan for the November 2026 outage: who you inform, which alternatives you put in place and what you record.
Appoint one person to follow the status, inform staff through a channel outside Microsoft 365, and decide per process what really has to go ahead today. The rest can wait until recovery.
Below you will find the steps to take now, the alternatives per service and what to record afterwards. Status as of Friday 13 November 2026, 10:15.
The first hour: oversight and a single point of contact
- One person or team follows the status and is the point of contact for questions.
- Communicate with staff through a channel that doesn't run on Microsoft 365.
- Decide which processes can't wait today and arrange those separately.
- Don't let staff start reinstalling software or deleting accounts themselves.
- Record times, impact and the steps taken for the evaluation.
In this outage, Exchange Online is at the core, and everything that depends on it is faltering: email, calendars, sharing in Teams, Copilot, Intune and security features in Defender (Microsoft's status page). Microsoft has not yet given a time for full recovery, and an earlier partial recovery did not hold (ABC7). So expect to spend part of the working day without fully working email.
The most important thing in the first hour is to stay calm. If everyone starts investigating on their own, you end up with ten different stories, laptops get reconfigured and someone sends customers a message with the wrong information. So appoint one person who follows the status page and the admin centre, and who reports the current situation at fixed times.
- Confirm that it is the outage
Check the status with Microsoft and rule out that it is your own network. How to do this is explained in the article on checking the status.
- Choose an emergency channel
A group in a messaging app, text messages, a phone tree or a notice on an intranet outside Microsoft 365. Say how often an update will follow.
- Decide what has to go ahead today
Quotes with a deadline, urgent orders, customer contact, rosters. Arrange these by phone or through another channel.
- Inform customers if necessary
Only if they will notice, for example if you can't reply to email in time. Keep it short and factual, with a phone number.
Alternatives per service
Not everything is down. According to Microsoft, calls, meetings, group chats and channel messages in Teams largely work, and files stored directly in SharePoint Online are accessible. Use what works, and cover the rest with simple alternatives.
What to use when a component isn't working, status as of 13 November 2026, 10:15
| What isn't working | What to use now | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Sending and receiving email | Phone, Teams chat if it's working, or another channel you already use | No business information via employees' personal email |
| Calendar and meeting requests | Confirm appointments by phone or in chat, share the meeting link in a channel | Update the calendar after recovery, otherwise you'll end up with double bookings |
| Sharing files with external parties | Share the file later, or use an existing sharing link | Don't send sensitive files via unfamiliar services |
| Copilot | Do the work without Copilot, or postpone it | Copilot can't currently access email, calendar and files |
| Setting up new laptops or phones | Postpone until after recovery | Enrolment in Intune may fail at the moment |
If email isn't working, employees reach for personal email or a free file-sharing service. Say in advance which alternative is allowed, so that customer data doesn't end up somewhere you can't see it.
What to say, and to whom
Good communication during an outage is short and factual. Say what's going on, what employees should and shouldn't do, and when the next update is due. Don't make predictions about recovery that you can't keep: Microsoft itself hasn't given a time.
With customers, less is often more. If a customer doesn't notice anything, there's nothing to report. If a customer expects an email reply today, let them know you're delayed by an outage at Microsoft and how to reach you. Point to Microsoft's official status page, not to your own estimates.
- Employees
What works, what doesn't, what they shouldn't do, which emergency channel applies and when the next update is due.
- Customers
Only if they notice. One sentence about the outage, a phone number and when you'll be reachable by email again.
- Suppliers
Confirm by phone any orders and appointments that would have gone by email today, and ask whether their own email is arriving.
- Management
Which processes are at a standstill, what that means today and which decisions are needed.
Afterwards: document and review
Once everything works again, it's tempting to carry straight on. Take a quarter of an hour anyway to record what happened: from when which services weren't working, how many employees were affected, which processes ground to a halt and what you did instead. After recovery, Microsoft publishes a report on the cause; compare it with your own notes.
You will need those notes if you want to claim compensation. Under certain conditions, Microsoft gives service credits for lower availability, but only on request and with details of the time, duration and affected users. What the SLA says exactly is covered in the article on SLA and compensation.
The hardest question comes next: how dependent do you want to be on a single supplier, and what will you do in the event of another outage? That is the subject of the article on dependency and business continuity. For the timeline and all affected services, read the outage overview.
point of contact who tracks the status, so that one story circulates instead of ten.
audiences to list: employees, customers, suppliers and management.
countries where the outage is noticeable, according to NOS.
Frequently asked questions
About what you do as a business during the Microsoft 365 outage.
What do I do as a business if Microsoft 365 isn't working?
Appoint one point of contact, communicate via a channel outside Microsoft 365, decide which processes can't wait today and handle them by phone or another channel.
Does Teams work during the outage?
According to Microsoft, calling, meetings, group chats and channel messages in Teams largely work. The calendar, meeting requests and live events work poorly, because they depend on Exchange Online.
Should I inform customers about the outage?
Only if they notice, for example if you can't be reached by email. Keep it short, give a phone number and point to Microsoft's status page.
Can employees temporarily use personal email?
Preferably not for business information. Agree in advance which alternative is allowed, so that customer data doesn't end up somewhere you can't see it.
Will I get compensation from Microsoft?
Possibly, if availability for the month drops below the SLA threshold. You have to submit a claim yourself, with details of the time, duration and affected users.
What should I record after the outage?
From when which services were down, how many employees were affected, which processes came to a standstill and what you did as a workaround. You will need this for the evaluation and for any claim.
Want less downtime during the next outage?
Appfront builds custom software and integrations, and helps organisations with resilience and continuity. Want to know which processes depend on a single supplier and how to cover that? Schedule a conversation with a developer.