Setting up your Partner Center account for success
A well-structured Microsoft Partner Center account is foundational to long-term success in the Azure Marketplace. Learn essential best practices for organizing your Partner Center account to ensure operational efficiency, seamless onboarding, and scalable growth. Whether you're a new software development company or an established partner, these insights will help you optimize your account setup to support your business goals and enhance your marketplace experience. Read more: Microsoft Partner Center account structure: Best practices for long-term success | Microsoft Community Hub and attend a webinar session where you will have the opportunity to have your questions answered. Event November 4th: How to structure your Microsoft Partner Center account | Microsoft Community HubEligible Microsoft Marketplace partners with MCA customers now to benefit from accelerated payouts
Microsoft Marketplace partners transacting with Microsoft Customer Agreements (MCA) customers can now benefit from accelerated payouts. This enhancement is intended to support improved cash flow and greater predictability, with daily payment processing that shortens the average time to receive funds. To learn more about how accelerated payouts work and how to view payouts with transactions for a given month, read the full announcement article. Announcing accelerated payouts to Microsoft Marketplace partners with MCA customers | Microsoft Community Hub
Announcing accelerated payouts to Microsoft Marketplace partners with MCA customers
Co-authored by Trevor_Yeats We’re excited to share that accelerated payouts are now available for partners making Microsoft Marketplace transactions with MCA (Microsoft Customer Agreement) customers. This new capability is designed to improve partner cash flow and make payments more predictable, with daily payouts that reduce the average time to receive funds. How accelerated payouts work Eligible partners will automatically get daily payouts for all offer types (SaaS, VMSR, etc.), pricing models (seat-based, metered), and deal types (public offers, private offers, private plans)—across all markets and currencies supported by Microsoft Marketplace. There is no action required by partners to benefit from accelerated payouts. Daily MCA payouts will show up as separate entries in the payments summary tab of your Partner Center earnings dashboard, right next to your monthly payouts. In addition, you’ll also see a new field called “estimatedPaymentDate” in the Earnings Report. Notes: Partners will not receive accelerated payouts for their very first payment from Microsoft. Accelerated payouts only apply after a partner has already received at least one payout. Partners may experience possible payout delays following a payment instrument change such as a change in bank or tax profile. Partners will continue to receive monthly payouts for EA transactions. Since payout times for EA customers are already compressed, daily payouts are not needed. How can a partner see all the payouts with transactions for a given month? Some partners reconcile their payouts monthly and would like to see all the payouts with transactions for a given month. Here’s how to do it: Option 1: Select custom dates Go to the Earnings Report In the upper right corner, you can filter by time period. Select “custom” and enter the start date and end date for a given month. Now you will be able to see all payouts with transactions for a specified month. Then select “Apply” in the bottom left. Note: this only shows customer transactions for the month you have selected. Option 2: Search for the first three letters of a month in Payment ID Go to the Earnings Report In the upper right corner, you can filter by payment ID. Type in the first three letters of a month and hit search. For example, for September, type in “sep” and you will be able to see all payouts with transactions for a specified month. Make sure you select the correct payment year. Then select “Apply” in the bottom left. Once you have applied filters, you can download the report. In the Earnings Report, select “Download Report”. Then select “Earnings – Marketplace” and you will be able to download a report with your custom filters. How to get started in Microsoft Marketplace Any company who is part of the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program can sell on the marketplace and benefit from accelerated payouts. Details are provided in our documentation, but at a high-level: Be a member of the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program (it’s free to join) Sign the marketplace publisher agreement Publish your public offer and sell private offers as needed. In addition, we have many support resources for partners depending on where they are on their marketplace journey. For example, software development companies can join ISV Success, within the Partner Program, for tools and resources that help them publish their solution and maximize reach through the marketplace. Learn more by visiting: Payout schedules and processes - Marketplace publisher | Microsoft Learn https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/marketplace-offers/payment-thresholds-methods-timeframes#number-of-days-for-payments-to-reach-payout-accountMicrosoft Partner Center account structure: Best practices for long-term success
About the author: David Starr is the founder and CEO of Cumulus26, where focus is on accelerating customer's Azure Marketplace journey from onboarding to business success. He is a former Principal Architect at Microsoft working on Azure Marketplace and a 6-time Microsoft MVP in Developer Tooling. Why account structure matters in Partner Center When first creating a Partner Center account, many Software Development Company (SDC) partners I’ve worked with dive straight into creating their transactable offers without first considering how their accounts are structured. This often leads to confusion about account setup, creating multiple “orphan” accounts, and support incidents that can delay the publication of your software to the Microsoft Marketplace--or even result in losing access to Partner Center. This article examines Partner Center account structures and the primary decisions to make when setting up your company’s accounts in the portal. We’ll cover the following. Initial considerations: Individual accounts. Understanding organizational account structures and configurations. Working with important identifiers used in account management and support scenarios. Setting up for long-term successful management of your accounts. This article ensures you’ll know how to structure your Microsoft Partner Center account so that it supports your organization’s needs today and can scale with you as you grow. Understanding Partner Center account management After initially creating your account, it’s tempting to skip user management and move on to other tasks in the portal. This can lead to the common mistake of failing to assign multiple account administrators right away. The predictable outcome is that if an account administrator leaves your organization, your staff could lose the ability to administer-- or even access-- Partner Center. This may sound intuitive upon reading it, so why mention it? It’s because I have worked with many publishers who failed to do this and were later unable to get the access they needed. This leads to time spent resolving support incidents, which can delay publishing your solution. Before diving into setting up an account, it’s helpful to understand there are three different accounts involved: Microsoft accounts, Azure Entra ID accounts, and Partner Center accounts. Although, the Microsoft account is essentially an extension of the Azure Entra ID account. In short, you must have an Azure Entra ID account to have a Partner Center account. These account types are shown in the image below. Each has its own features and capabilities. It is worth noting while you do need an Entra ID account, you do not need an Azure subscription, which allows creation of services like databases or virtual machines. This can be an important point for Azure administrators who provide accounts strictly for use with Partner Center. Setting up an Azure tenant in Partner Center Azure accounts for your organization are stored in tenants, which provide identity, security, and account management through Microsoft Entra ID. At least one tenant must be associated with Partner Center to manage the portal’s accounts. This allows those with accounts in the tenant to also have accounts in Partner Center. You may associate a pre-existing Entra ID account with Partner Center, or you may create one if needed. Regardless of which technique you use, you can manage users and permissions for Partner Center after configuring your tenant. User accounts After configuring your tenant, head over to the user management screen in Account settings, then select User management in the left side menu. As we mentioned earlier, the next account you’ll want to configure is another Global administrator. If you created the Azure tenant you are working with, you already have Global Administrator permissions in Partner Center. Otherwise, you may need to contact your Azure administrator to get the permissions you need. This is why it’s common (and good) practice for organizations with pre-existing Azure tenants to have an Azure administrator initially set up Partner Center. Adding another Partner Center administrator For this next step, there are three options for adding that new person to Partner Center: Create new user – Used if there are no other user accounts in the tenant. Add existing user – Use this if there are existing user accounts in the tenant. Invite outside user – May be used for inviting someone from outside your organization to manage Partner Center for you. Regardless of which method you choose, since you are adding a second Global administrator, give them that role during account setup. This is the first role listed in the account setup process as shown here. Configuring partner global and location accounts Now that you have at least two global administrators, you can turn your attention to setting up your organizational accounts. There are two types in Partner Center. Partner global account (PGA) Partner location account (PLA) Structuring your accounts There is one PGA per SDC and one or more PLAs. A PGA is an overarching account containing contact and other information for your organization. Each PLA account represents a different location for the organization. A single PLA is created when you first create a Partner Center account. This may be enough for some organizations, but for many SDCs it’s a good idea to consider how you will organize the company and its products in the future. See the image below for a typical example of PGA and PLA structures, the information associated with them, and their roles. Some organizations may want multiple PLAs to represent different sales centers or divisions within the SDC. It’s also a good idea for smaller SDCs to consider future growth at this stage. Think about how and where your company may eventually do business. However, you do not need multiple PLAs to sell your solution in multiple countries--you can sell worldwide even if you have only one PLA. Both PGAs and PLAs have unique identifiers, examples of which are shown in the below image. You may need to access these when working with Microsoft. To do so, go to: Account Settings > Identifiers > Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program Managing publisher accounts and identifiers Each PLA has one or more publisher accounts, which are established when enrolling in the Microsoft Marketplace program. Each publisher also receives its own set of identifiers, and it’s common to be asked for these in customer support scenarios. When creating a new publisher, you get to specify your publisher account’s primary ID, but a second Seller ID is automatically assigned for you. To access publisher IDs, visit: Account settings > Identifiers > Publisher Tax and payment profiles-- used by Microsoft to bill on your behalf and to pay you for customer purchases-- are associated with publisher accounts. Publisher accounts are sometimes used by different billing departments or to organize products into logical groups. See the image below for a typical example. As you can see, the account structure is straightforward. If you consider it in advance of setting up Partner Center, you will be more likely to avoid configuration mistakes and be set up well for future growth. Organizing offers and plans for marketplace publishing We’ve seen how to structure user and organizational accounts to ensure a great Partner Center experience. When it’s time to set up your products to sell in the marketplace there are two more entities involved, offers and plans. Offers represent your base software product and plans are used to sell one or more SKUs of the product. For example, Cumulus26’s AMPup solution for marketplace publishers may be our offer, and has different plans for team, professional, and enterprise versions. To support global software sales, each plan is associated with one or more global markets. For example, a US-based publisher may sell software in Canada, the UK, and Germany. Selling markets are designated for each plan. Of course, each offer and plan receives its own ID. For each, you must specify the ID as you create each entity, and I recommend planning a logical naming convention for these IDs as you may need to navigate marketplace features using them at some point. Now you have a complete picture of Partner Center structures from PGAs all the way to plans as shown in the image below, which represents a single-region seller. This turns out to be the most common Partner Center account configuration due to its simplicity and the needs of most SDCs. Conclusion: Building for scalability and support There is a strong relationship between Microsoft Azure Entra ID and Partner Center accounts. For many SDCs the simplest path to successful user management is to start with an Entra ID Global Administrator setting up your initial Partner Center account. Don’t forget the important first step of adding a second Partner Center account administrator. You are now ready to model your organization and products in Partner Center, from PLAs and PGAs to offers and plans. You also understand the ID structures of each entity. You can refer to this article for help on where to find them when needed. With a solid understanding of Partner Center user and organizational account structures, you are ready to begin configuring your users and organization in Partner Center. To learn more and ask questions, attend the How to structure your Microsoft Partner Center account for long term success | Microsoft Community Hub session on November 4th. If you are unable to attend, the session will be recorded for viewing after.Welcome to the FY26 Q1 Partner Digest!
Stay up to date on the latest Microsoft Marketplace news, tools, and resources to help you grow your business. Subscribe to the Partner Digest label to never miss an update. 🚀 Noteworthy Highlights Introducing Microsoft Marketplace: Growth starts here. Turn your agents and other cloud-based innovations into sales, at scale, with Microsoft Marketplace. Learn more Updated Agreement: The Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program Agreement has been updated, effective September 22, 2025. Review now Partner Center Security: Multifactor authentication (MFA) is now required for Partner Center access. API enforcement beings April 2026. Learn more App Advisor Enhancements: Six new features help software developers build, publish, and sell apps faster and smarter on the Microsoft Marketplace. Explore now Fabric Extensibility Toolkit: Software companies can help customers bring apps to Fabric, speed development, and integrate workloads. Get started today Azure AI Foundry Updates: Now featuring GPT-5, OpenAI gpt-oss, Foundry Local support, and a new Browser Automation tool to help you build intelligent agents using natural language. Learn more Partner Center AI assistant: Now localized and smarter than ever with support for additional languages, providing quick answers to your day-to-day questions. Learn more Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program Concierge: Your go-to resource for all program related desk engagements, streamlined and more impactful than ever. Learn more 🌟 Microsoft partner resources: New for FY26 MCAPS Start recap Microsoft kicked off FY26 with a bold vision for partner growth in the AI era. Nicole Dezen outlines how partners can lead with innovation and scale impact. Explore strategic solution areas, expanded MAICPP investments, and GTM support.👉 Read the full post New benefits & resources New AI-powered benefits and tools are here to help partners thrive. Julie Sanford details how to get Azure credits, Copilot seats, and custom GTM materials to accelerate agentic AI adoption.👉 Read the full post Blog Series & Playbooks: Catch up on our Cloud and AI Platforms blog series. Part one: Capturing the market opportunity Part two: Migrations & Modernizations Explore the latest Cloud and AI platforms and Agentic AI partner playbooks which includes key skilling resources, investments, win formulas and more. Unlock your Microsoft AI Cloud potential with Partner Skilling Hub: Visit our skilling hub for the latest training resources to earn designations and specializations. Explore the most recent skilling blog for key skilling-related announcements. Incentives ISV Success Advanced Package: Top-performing partners with Certified Software Designations can qualify for financial incentives to build AI solutions or migrate customers to Azure. The package supports every stage of ISV Success. Learn more. Migration Incentives: New end-customer migration incentives are now available to help software companies and advanced specialized system integrators securely and efficiently move software companies’ end customers to modern applications running on Azure. See Azure Incentives > ISV Engagements tab in the incentive guide for details. 🗓️ Events & Office Hours June-September recaps June: The Microsoft Marketplace Ecosystem Opportunity Explore how AI is reshaping solution development and customer engagement in this conversation with Cyril Belikoff, Microsoft’s new leader for Marketplace. Learn how the marketplace is simplifying procurement and accelerating growth. A “lightbulb moment” for the industry and the critical role partners play in delivering innovation on Microsoft’s platform. 👉 Watch the recording July: Marketplace Rewards FY26 Learn how channel partners can benefit from multiparty private offers and new rewards tier thresholds to unlock $200K in sponsorship. 👉 Watch the recording August: Co-Sell Blueprint & Certified Designations Gain real-world co-sell strategies and learn about Microsoft’s Customer Engagement Methodology from industry experts. Plus, get the latest on Certified Software Designation benefits for FY26. 👉 Watch the recording from Ultimate Partner session on Co-sell 👉 Watch the recording on Certified Software Designations and download the slide deck 📖Explore Microsoft Customer Engagement Methodology (MCEM) September: Migrate and Modernize Summit Our Sep 23-24 event is now available online to help services partners learn how agentic AI can boost their agility by moving to the cloud quickly and effectively. Catch the replay. Upcoming Events Microsoft AI Tour for Partners is back- Join a free, one-day event to accelerate your AI journey with sales best practices, growth opportunities, hands-on labs, and technical deep dives. Discover upcoming events in cities around the globe. Join the Fabric Global Hack (Sept 15–Nov 3, 2025) to build data and AI solutions with Microsoft Fabric, collaborate globally, and compete for prizes up to $10,000. Participants get 50% off Fabric certifications. Join us at the Azure Dev Summit from October 13-15, a Microsoft-sponsored event designed for developers, architects, and technology leaders. Explore the latest in Azure, .NET, and Microsoft AI, gain insights from inspiring speakers, and connect with peers driving innovation. 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Celebrate the winners and finalists of Partner of the Year Awards 👉 Register now and stay up to date with event news at Microsoft Ignite Unplugged. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Stay tuned to the https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/marketplace-blog/bg-p/MarketplaceBlog for upcoming recaps and new office hour announcements. 💬 Share Your Feedback! We truly appreciate your feedback and want to ensure these Partner Digests deliver the information you need to succeed in the marketplace. If you have any feedback or suggestions on how we can continue to improve the content to best support you, we’d love to hear from you in the comments below!
Request for Private Link Support in Microsoft Office Add-in Store
I'm currently in the process of publishing an Office Add-in. From what I’ve observed in Microsoft’s add-in review process, there doesn’t seem to be a way to create a preview or private link for an add-in published to the store. I’d like to obtain a private link to test the add-in across different platforms before making it publicly available. This would help ensure there are no issues when users install it from the store on various platforms. Other cloud providers, such as Google, offer similar functionality for their Google Workspace add-ons, allowing developers to test and share private versions before public release. Microsoft should consider providing a similar feature for Office Add-ins to support better testing, validation, and rollout strategies
Unable to open support tickets; error: "There was a problem retrieving the support request details."
Hello, We are looking to become a verified partner, but are unable to do so due to this error in communicating with the support team. I have tried creating multiple tickets, but after it is created, it's not possible to open it anymore. Upon opening error is thrown: "There was a problem retrieving the support request details." I tried contacting support, but they seem to give a generic response unrelated to the issue and close the ticket. May someone help, please? Generic response:
