Forum Discussion
Guest Users vs. External Users
We use the terms interchangeably at Microsoft as well. External user is an older term from back when all "guests" in the directory authenticated outside of the home tenant. When we added support for managed guest users (i.e. the user authenticates inside the home tenant), the "external" piece stopped making sense and "guest user" was born.
And as with many of these types of things, we ended up using both names to refer to the same set of features. If there is a feature/scenario where this language does make a difference, we try to make sure it's clearly labeled to avoid confusion.
Thanks,
Stephen Rice
OneDrive Program Manager II
When an organization uses Microsoft, does the external/guest user sign in to my org's SharePoint using the same credentials they use to log into their's? Because that's what I've been telling them for a couple of years now. StephenRice
- Ref: open the invite link with Incognito tab - yes, this really is the only way to make sure the guest signs in properly by making them enter and verify the right account and credentials.
BTW: I seem to have more success if I send them to SharePoint first rather than Teams or OWA - do these different URLs change the guest-register-in-AD experience?
https://outlook.office365.com/owa/account@realm/groupsubscription.ashx?realm=realm&source=WelcomeEmail&action=files
https://teams.microsoft.com/l/team/guid1(thread.skype/conversations?tenantId=guid2
https://realm.sharepoint.com/sites/site/Shared%20Documents/ - Yes, you can delete from AzureAD and invite again. There really isn't a way to prevent where they come in from because they are essentially mapping their account to the guest account that is setup in your AD to theirs. You can recommend to that user to right click and open the invite link with Incongnito tab so they can make sure to select the right login to use.
So is there a way to fix an account that was added as a Microsoft Account, but should have been external AD? We invited a few guest accounts, and one person connected successfully as an External AD account, and the other shows up as "Microsoft Account", so I assume they created a new Microsoft account with the same creds as suggested by ChrisWebbTech . Now they can't access some resources (Teams) and I assume it is cookies/cached creds. Can we just remove the account from Azure AD, and then re-invite them again? Is it entirely on the guest to select "Organizational account" or can we send a specific invite to prevent them from signing up with a Microsoft Account?
- Sam Larson
Microsoft
Shery Kirby Do you currently have a support ticket opened with Microsoft? I'd love to have our teams take a look at some logging and details about the user accounts logging in. Feel free to PM me as well!
- I Honestly try and make use of anyone links when working external they are much less hassle when it comes to those outside “users”. And now since you can set passwords on them they are even more of an alternative.
- ChrisWebbTech It hasn't been easy to help the external users to understand the importance of deleting browsing history, clearing cookies and cache and close browser and then open in private browser. Most come back seconds later saying they've done all that with the same access denied screenshot; more times than not that doesn't really happen. Maybe one day my org will allow video chat with our external users so we can better help them. I've spent hours on just this one issue today going back and forth. And, I must say, this is a common issue. I just thought I'd seek Community help just in case I've missed something.
