Do you need to send an email notification when a task is completed in Planner?

Unfortunately, there are no options in Planner for getting notified when tasks are completed. This means other work dependent on completion might not get started promptly.

With Power Automate, you can easily automate this process and receive a notification as soon as a task is done. This feature is particularly useful for project managers and team leaders who need to keep track of their team’s progress.

The good news is these are very easy to set up from available templates.

This post is going to show you how to use the templates and customize them to your needs.

Available Notification Settings in Planner

Planner provides users with two useful notification settings.

These settings can only be controlled at the app level. So your settings will apply to all plans you have access to.

You can access these setting in the Planner app.

1. Go to the Planner App.
2. Click on the Settings icon in the top right.
3. Click on the Notifications option.

Here you will find two options that you can turn on or off.

• Someone assigns a task to me: When a task is assigned to you, you can receive an email, or push notification.
• A task assigned to me is late, due today, or due in the next 7 days: You can receive an email when a task assigned to you is late, due today, or due in the next 7 days. This is a useful feature to ensure that you are aware of task deadlines and can take appropriate action.

Press the Save button to update your settings.

You will notice there is no available option for notifications when a task is completed. This is where you can use Power Automate to fill in the gap.

Templates to Send Email when Planner Task is Completed

Power Automate provides templates that you can use to quickly create common automated workflows.

There are several templates available for automating various Planner workflows.

One such template is the Send an email when a Planner task is completed template. This template allows you to send an email to anyone you choose when a task is completed based on any selected plan.

You can also customize the email message and include dynamic content such as the task details and completion date.

Here’s how to use the template.

1. Click on the Templates menu in the Power Automate portal.
2. Type in Planner Task Completed in the template search and press Enter. This should filter the template results.
3. Click on the Email tab to narrow down the templates to those that send emails. This should now show only two templates.
4. Click on the Send an email when a Planner task is completed template.

This will lead you to a screen that lists the connections required for the template.

5. Give the required permission and click on the Continue button.

This will open the flow builder with the prebuilt flow. In this case it’s a simple flow that contains a When a task is completed trigger and Send an email action. This will send the email anytime a task is completed in the selected plan.

6. Select the Group Id for the plan for which you wish to receive notifications,
7. Select the Plan Id that you want notification from.
8. Add at least one user to the To field in the Send an email action.

You can customize the email message Body with dynamic content as needed.

Templates to Send Email When Planner Task I Created is Completed

Another template that you can use is the Send me an email when a Planner task that I created is completed template.

This template allows you to get notifications only for those tasks that you yourself created.

This will create the above flow for you in the flow builder. It uses a Condition action to compare the task creator ID to your ID and then sends an email if these are equal.

You will need to fill in a few required fields in the actions.

1. Select the Plan Id in which you want to receive notifications.
2. Select the Source time zone as UTC in the CompletedTime action. All date and timestamps from the Planner trigger are in UTC, so they need to be converted to your own timezone.
3. Select your own timezone in the Destination time zone dropdown. For example, EST.

You can then customize the Send an email action as required. For example, you might want to customize the Subject, Body, or even the To fields.

⚠️ Warning: This template uses a deprecated trigger. It still currently works, but may stop working in the future. You should change the trigger in your flow to the current When a task is completed trigger.

Conclusions

Sending an email when a planner task is completed is not available from the Planner settings.

However, you can use Power Automate to achieve these types of automated notifications.

Power Automate has a When a task is completed trigger for the Planner connector that will allow you to create notifications on task completion. This can be easily set up using templates with just a few clicks.

Have you used the template feature to create flows based on Planner task completion before? Let me know in the comments!