Microsoft Teams
RefineAI Answers works where your team already talks: ask the bot a question in a Teams channel or chat and it replies with the same cited, confidence-badged answers as the web app — drawn only from your organisation's documents.
Everything about answers in Asking questions applies in Teams too; this page covers what's different in Teams: how to talk to the bot, what other people can see, and how a channel decides which documents it answers from.
Using the bot
Your admin installs the bot once for the whole organisation. After that you'll find it in three places, and the choice matters for who sees the conversation:
| Where | How to ask | Who sees it | Default scope |
|---|---|---|---|
| Personal chat — the bot's icon in the Teams sidebar or app list | Just type your question | Only you | All documents |
| Channel | @mention the bot — type @, pick it, then ask: @bot what is the returns policy? | Everyone in the channel, permanently | The channel's mapping, if an admin set one |
| Group chat | @mention the bot | The people in that chat | All documents |
- In a channel or group chat the bot only responds when it's @mentioned — that's how Teams works for every bot. Reply in the same thread to ask a follow-up; the bot remembers the conversation and the scope you chose.
- A personal chat is private. Nothing you ask there appears in any channel, so it's the right place for exploratory or sensitive questions. It has no channel mapping, so use
in:or the picker card if you want to narrow it. - Channel posts are channel history. Both your question and the bot's reply stay in the channel like any other message. If a thread shouldn't live there, ask in a personal chat instead — or delete it afterwards.
- Deleting the bot's replies is controlled by Teams, not by RefineAI Answers: team owners can delete any message in a channel, and a team setting lets members delete messages too. The bot's replies are ordinary messages for this purpose.
Where an answer comes from
Every bot reply begins with an Answered from line, so you always know the scope it used:
- Answered from: all documents — the whole library.
- Answered from: Product (channel default) — the channel is mapped to collections by an admin.
- Answered from: HR Policies (requested) — you asked for that scope with
in:or a picker card. - Answered from: HR Policies (conversation scope) — a scope chosen earlier in the thread is still in effect.
When several scopes could apply, the most specific wins: your explicit choice beats the thread's earlier choice, which beats the channel default, which beats all documents.
in: — scoping a question as you type
Prefix your question with in: and a collection name:
in:Product what does the Growth tier cost per month?
in:"HR Policies" how much annual leave can be carried over?
in:all who owns the Aurora roadmap?
- Quote names that contain spaces:
in:"HR Policies". - The choice sticks for the thread — follow-ups stay scoped until you change it.
in:all(orin:*) clears back to all documents — including in a mapped channel, where it deliberately overrides the channel default for that thread.- Names are matched case-insensitively. If the name doesn't match a collection exactly, the bot never guesses — it shows a picker instead.
Picker cards
You don't have to remember collection names. The bot offers buttons in two situations:
- Unrecognised or ambiguous
in:name — a card lists your collections (plus All documents); choosing one answers your original question with that scope and keeps it for the thread. Very large organisations see the first ten collections with a hint to usein:"exact name"for the rest. - First question in an unmapped thread — the bot answers straight away from all documents, then attaches a one-time "narrow this thread?" offer underneath. Ignore it and it won't ask again;
in:remains available whenever you want it.
For admins
Channel-to-collection mapping — the zero-effort default everyone in a channel inherits — is configured in the web app under Settings → Teams.
Mappings and collection membership are applied when a question is asked, so changing either takes effect on the next answer — documents never need re-uploading or re-processing.
If the bot replies "Sorry, I couldn't verify your organization", your Teams organisation isn't registered with RefineAI Answers yet — contact your RefineAI Answers administrator.