We see a ton of requests to get an email notification when an item (email, case etc) enters a CRM queue. CRM 2011 can handle this out of the box, no special tools required. The first thing to note is that we want to capture the creation of or the on change event for the queue item depending on your needs.

Inside a workflow, you can create a queue item. This will create the item in the queue from a workflow.

Queue Item is the record that is created when something is “moved” into a queue. This queue item record is actually a pointer to the item now in the queue. So, under set properties, select the queue the item is in, then select the queue item.  Here’s I am referencing the queue GP and the actual case.

Next, I have another workflow called Queue Email Notification. This was created on the Entity Queue Item and is running under the option: Record fields change, on the field Queue (which is the name of the queue). This will capture the name of change of the Queue Item Record ( Hence inserting it into a queue).

Now you can send a user or team (direct) , email address (using a contact under a record, could be a distribution list as well). The workflow will have a send-email which will send something like “A new case has been created in the queue!” to the address created.

Also of note in CRM 2011, the new feature Record Dynamic URL. This gives you the URL for any entity! This used to be a plugin or ISV solution in past CRM versions. Now, by simply adding the Record Dynamics URL from the left the screen, the email will contain the complete URL Hyperlink to record.