Can you Power Automate Outlook email notifications 6 weeks prior to Microsoft Outlook Calendar Events?

[CoolGear12]

I am looking to have an automatic email be sent to our Sales and Channel Management teams 6 weeks prior to a calendar event.  I would like this to be automatic and change if the calendar event changes.  This is necessary for us to start our internal processes to ensure we are prepared for our calendar events. Any help is greatly appreciated - if this isn't possible with Power Automate - then I am going to have to look to another app to help with making this automation - but I figured I would start here first.  I am very new to Power Automate and I have looked without luck to see if I could find an article to help me with this process.  

Thanks,

Erin

[Anas-Uddin]

Hi @CoolGear12,

Your requirement to send automatic email notifications to the Sales and Channel Management teams 6 weeks prior to a calendar event is indeed possible with Power Automate. You can achieve this by creating a scheduled cloud flow that runs daily to check for events occurring 6 weeks from the current date. Here's a step-by-step guide to help you set it up:

1. Create a new Scheduled Cloud Flow:

   • Go to Power Automate and select "Create" from the left navigation pane.
   • Choose "Scheduled cloud flow", give it a name, and set the schedule to run once a day.

2. Get Calendar Events:

   • Add a new step to search for calendar events. Depending on where your events are stored (e.g., Outlook Calendar, Google Calendar), you might use an action like "List events" (for Outlook) or a similar one for Google.
   • Configure the action to fetch events from your specific calendar.

3. Filter Events:

   • Since actions like "List events" may not directly support filtering for dates exactly 6 weeks ahead, you might need to add a condition to filter the events based on their start date.
   • Use an expression to calculate the date 6 weeks from the current day and compare it with the event's start date.

4. Send Email Notification:

   • For events that match the condition (i.e., occurring 6 weeks from today), add an action to send an email to your Sales and Channel Management teams. Configure the email action with the necessary details about the event and a message tailored to the preparation needs.

5. Handle Changes in Event Dates:

   • Since your flow runs daily, it will automatically account for any changes in event dates. If an event date changes, the flow will pick it up in its daily check and send notifications accordingly based on the new date.

This setup ensures that your teams receive notifications 6 weeks in advance for any calendar events, with the flexibility to adjust to changes in event scheduling. If you're new to Power Automate, Microsoft provides extensive documentation and tutorials that can help you get started with creating flows. Additionally, exploring templates and community forums can offer insights and examples to guide your flow creation process

If this resolves your issue, please mark this post as the answer to help others in the community. Thank you!

Best Regards,
Anas Uddin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/anasuddinpk

[CoolGear12]

Hi @Anas-Uddin 

Excited to know that this function is possible with Power Automate.  I am getting hung up on the Calendar Event start time and end time - which I am sure is quite simple once you understand how it works - I am assuming I would put today's date as the start time - but the end time - I would want that open ended - correct?  if so - how do I do this?

The second issue I am having is figuring out what expression to use for calculating 6 weeks ahead of the calendar event.  I found a function like the following online - however it was applied for a different purpose than my calendar events, and I have not been able to get a successful result... 

formatDateTime(addToTime(items('Apply_to_each')?['Starttime'],-6,'Week'),'yyyy-MM-dd')  

Do you think this function should work?  If so - where to I add it?  Also - I am in Eastern Standard Time... does that make a difference in my formulas for searching? 

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Erin