Multiparty private offers FAQ

Cloud marketplaces are outpacing cloud growth and becoming the centralized go-to-market channel of the future. Private offers empower custom deal-making and are the key to unlocking enterprise customers and offer benefits like negotiated pricing, private terms and conditions, and specialized configurations. There are three types of private offers:

• Private offers for customers: Offer the ability for ISV partners to create a private offer to sell directly to a customer. If the customer has a cloud consumption commitment with Microsoft, the sale can count toward the customer's commitment if the offer is incentivized for Azure IP co-selling. For more information, see ISV to customer private offers.
• Multiparty private offers: Multiparty private offers empower eligible partners to come together, create personalized offers with custom payouts, and sell directly to Microsoft customers with simplified selling through the marketplace. For customers that have a cloud consumption commitment, every dollar of the sale counts toward their commitment when they purchase solutions that are eligible for Azure IP co-selling. It also enables the customer's preferred partner to work with ISVs on marketplace deals and specify a custom price to that partner for the deal.
• Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) private offers: Offer the ability for ISV partners to extend a margin to motivate partners in the CSP program to sell their solution. It gives ISVs an advocate for their product while helping ISVs scale to sell in the small and medium-sized business (SMB) market. For CSPs, it gives them the opportunity to package ISV solutions with their software and services sales to offer unique customer value. For more information, see ISV to CSP partner private offers and Marketplace margins.

* Private offers are available for all segments, but there are always exceptions. To help you prioritize your customer engagement efforts, private offers and multiparty private offers are best suited for the enterprise. CSP private offers are best suited for the SMB/cloud market.

Benefits vary depending on the audience. Ultimately, the value of multiparty private offers is that the customer can maintain their trusted partner relationships. Partners can work together to create customized solutions for customers by using their unique cloud services.

• Customer benefit: Many customers have preferred partners from whom they buy their software. With multiparty private offers, customers can maintain their trusted partner relationships while streamlining the procurement and deployment of the solution through the commercial marketplace. Partners can procure ISV solutions on the customer's behalf and package them into the offer for the customer. This practice simplifies the process and consolidates transactions. Now with multiparty private offers, customers with a cloud consumption commitment can count their purchase toward their cloud consumption commitment. Microsoft is unique in that 100% of sales count toward a customer's MACC automatically when customers buy eligible solutions. Using precommitted cloud spend is one of the main motivators for customers to buy through cloud marketplaces. With multiparty private offers, customers can purchase through their preferred partner and still have the sale count toward their cloud consumption commitment. For more information, see Azure services and marketplace offers that are eligible for MACC. ​​
• ISV partner benefit: Many customers use partners as trusted advisors for purchasing, implementation, and support decisions. Multiparty private offers unlock deals for ISVs when the partner owns the customer relationship and needs to be included in the transaction.
• Channel partner benefit: Multiparty private offers give partners selling software and services the ability to work with ISVs. They can create personalized offers with customized payouts together and sell directly to Microsoft customers through the marketplace. The software sales count toward the customers' cloud consumption commitment. New opportunities are unlocked where partners can proactively collaborate on enterprise deal-making and help manage the customers' broad technology estate as trusted advisers.

Multiparty private offers are available to customers who purchase in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

• Customers can purchase multiparty private offers with an EA, Microsoft Customer Agreement (MCA), and indirect EA, and through web direct motions. Customers must provide their partner or the ISV with their billing account ID. Customers can run the eligibility check tool and download the report to identify their billing account ID and verify if they're approved to purchase in the marketplace. Find alternative ways to locate the billing account ID in the Azure portal. For customers with an EA with Microsoft, the billing account ID is the same as their EA enrollment number.
• Customers must also have their market currency matching their billing account currency to be eligible for multiparty private offers configured with absolute pricing for the partner price. For example, Canadian customers with market currency in Canadian dollars and who opt to set up a billing account currency in US dollars aren't eligible if the offer must be configured with absolute pricing for the partner price. Only the discount price (percent discount) for a partner price is supported.

Any partner selling through multiparty private offers must be a member of the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program and be actively using the Microsoft commercial marketplace as a go-to-market and sales channel.

ISVs or partners that build software or software as a solution (SaaS) solutions must have a transactable offer with public plans available to participate in multiparty private offers. If the ISV is new to Microsoft or doesn't yet have a transactable offer and needs assistance, ISV Success can help.

Channel partners must be enrolled in the commercial marketplace and have a US or UK tax profile set up in Partner Center for the marketplace. US partners must also file their resale certificates with Microsoft. UK partners must claim a tax treaty benefit on their W-8BEN form in the tax profile setup to be eligible to sell through multiparty private offers.

Sales through multiparty private offers are limited to customers purchasing in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

ISVs across the globe are invited to participate. The channel partner you work with must have a US or UK tax profile set up in Partner Center. The customer must make the purchase in the United States, the United Kingdom, or Canada.

The CSP partner private offer (also known as margin sharing) is a private offer type that motivates eligible partners to sell an ISV's solution. ISVs can make private offers and extend a margin to partners in the CSP program. It helps ISVs reach small and medium-sized customers by scaling through the Microsoft ecosystem of over 90,000 partners in the CSP program. With margin sharing, the CSP partner owns the end-to-end customer relationship, including the pricing strategy and billing. They bill the customer outside of the marketplace. The deal is done on the CSP's contracts.

All partners, including partners enrolled in the CSP program, can participate in multiparty private offers and work with ISV partners to create custom private offers for customers with an EA or MCA. The partner still owns the customer relationship, but with multiparty private offers, the customer purchases directly through the marketplace and Microsoft bills the customer.

To prepare for the multiparty private offer opportunity, ISVs should have transactable solutions published to the commercial marketplace. After they have their offer listed, they should use the current private offer capabilities and build relationships with other partners.

For partners in the CSP program, start selling ISV solutions via ISV to CSP margin-sharing private offers and expand to multiparty private offers.

For partners who aren't in the CSP program, start building your network of partnerships with ISVs and identify Azure benefit-eligible solutions.

Also, channel partners must enroll in the Microsoft commercial marketplace on Partner Center and have a completed US or UK tax profile associated with their marketplace seller ID. Channel partners with US tax profiles must provide their resale certificates to Microsoft in advance of any sales through this offering. Channel partners with UK tax profiles must claim a tax treaty benefit on their W-8BEN form to be eligible to participate in multiparty private offerings.

Yes. Channel partners with US tax profiles must provide their resale certificate to Microsoft at least five business days before the sale of any multiparty private offer. Resale certificates must be provided for each seller ID used to sell multiparty private offers. They must be provided even if your company already provided them for other programs, such as the CSP program or Volume Licensing (VL) program. Your certificates must be accurately completed and signed, and they must include the state where your company is headquartered, at a minimum. Your resale certificates must be on file at Microsoft before you sell multiparty private offers or sales tax might be charged on your purchase as required by various tax laws. To file your tax exemption, request support through Partner Center. Provide your marketplace seller ID and supply the appropriate information.

Channel partners with a UK tax profile must claim a tax treaty benefit on their W-8BEN form in their tax profile setup to be eligible to sell through multiparty private offers. To verify tax treaty benefit status in Partner Center, go to the Account settings > Payout and tax profiles > Tax profile tab. Tax Treaty status should be True. If the tax treaty status is False, you must update the tax profile and claim a tax treaty benefit before you can sell a multiparty private offer. To claim a tax treaty benefit, select "Yes" for the claim tax treaty question in the Tax Treaty Benefits section of the W-8BEN form.

Yes. Eligible channel partners (with US tax profiles and required resale certificate or UK tax profiles with tax treaty benefit) can sell to customers in all supported markets (United States, United Kingdom, Canada). For example, a partner located in the United Kingdom that meets the UK tax profile requirements can sell to customers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

Get support verifying that you completed prerequisite tax and payment profile account setup steps by emailing channelready@microsoft.com.

For self-serve help on setting up tax and payment profiles, review the following video tutorials:

• Set up a commercial marketplace tax profile in Partner Center
• Set up a commercial marketplace payment profile in Partner Center

Multiparty private offers adhere to the policies and terms included in the Microsoft Publishers Agreement, the Commercial Marketplace Terms of Use, the commercial marketplace certification policies, and the commercial marketplace review policies. View the specific terms for multiparty private offers within the Microsoft Publishers Agreement Addendum B.

You can create multiparty private offers for the following transactable marketplace offer types: SaaS, Azure virtual machine, Azure application, and Azure container. Multiparty private offers don't support the sale of professional services to customers. Sales of software offers can't include professional services or hardware in the software price-by policy. To sell your professional services to customers in the United States, the United Kingdom, or Canada, create a customer private offer by using the transactable professional service offer type. Private offers aren't supported for products offered in AppSource.

To create a multiparty private offer, you need the billing account ID of your customer. Customers can find the billing account information in the Azure portal either in:

• Cost Management + Billing > Settings > Properties
• If the customer knows the subscription they plan to use for the purchase, select Subscriptions > select the relevant subscription > Properties (or Billing Properties). The customer must be an owner or contributor on the billing account to access this information.

If a customer doesn't have a billing account, they can create one by signing up on Azure.com. See Billing account scopes in the Azure portal.

Applying the multiparty private offer at the billing account ID level means that if new subscriptions are added to the customer's Azure plan, the multiparty private offer automatically applies to those subscriptions also. No edits are required to the multiparty private offer.

Billing account information is available only to the customer. ISV partners or channel partners can't access it.

Customer start dates and end dates define the window of time when your multiparty private offer prices are available for your customer to purchase. These dates are different from the term lengths (monthly, one-year, two-years, three-years) of your included products in the multiparty private offer and the customer's related subscription start and end dates.

Select Accepted date as the start date to make the price available for the customer to purchase as soon as the multiparty private offer is accepted. If you want a private price to be available to the customer immediately on acceptance, select Accepted date.

Select Specific month to make the multiparty private price available in a future calendar month. For example, if you create a multiparty private offer on May 15 and want the private price to be available to the customer on June 1, select June. The multiparty private offer starts on the first day of the month and ends on the last day. You can't select specific start and end dates within the month. If your customer purchases the public version of your product before June 1, they won't see the private price you configured for them via the multiparty private offer. They also won't receive the private price if they purchase before June 1. The time zone for the customer accept-by date is Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

The accept-by date is the private offer's expiration date. Your customer must accept the multiparty private offer before the end of this date in UTC time or the private offer expires. Selecting End date specifies the date on which the multiparty private price and terms end. The time zone for the customer accept-by date and end date is UTC.

ISV partners can use a discounted price to provide a percentage-based discount on top of a publicly listed plan. You can use it only when the private price is lower than the publicly listed plan price. You can use the absolute price to specify a price point higher, lower, or equal to the publicly listed plan price. The price can be applied only at a plan level. You can apply an absolute price to virtual machine software reservation offers but not for virtual machine offers or any plans that have a trial enabled.

No. Having multiple options on a private offer creates confusion for prenegotiated enterprise sales and often results in purchase mistakes. Create the private offer for the desired subscription term. Your public plan might include multiple purchase options for customers to self-serve at a public non-negotiated rate if you choose to offer this sales model.

Yes. ISVs can set custom market prices for non-US markets by using the existing import/export price functionality. It isn't subject to Microsoft conversion for a customer price. Channel partners set a markup percentage from the price set by the ISV. This percentage applies to all currencies.

Within a multiparty private offer, the customer adjustment % configured by channel partners applies uniformly to both the product pricing and the custom meter pricing.

Yes. ISVs and partners can attach up to five customer terms and conditions that the customer must accept as part of the multiparty private offer. Multiparty private offers currently don't support the ability for ISVs and partners to exchange partner-only terms for acceptance that don't get passed to the customer.

Yes. Withdrawing a multiparty private offer means your customer can no longer access it.

• For ISVs: An ISV can withdraw a multiparty private offer only if the status is Pending partner action. An ISV can't withdraw a multiparty private offer if your partner on the deal already sent it to the customer and the status is Pending acceptance or Accepted by the customer.
• For channel partners: Channel partners can withdraw a multiparty private offer only if the status is Pending acceptance. A channel partner can't withdraw a multiparty private offer if the customer accepted the multiparty private offer and the status is Accepted by the customer.

ISV partners can use the Clone option to make an editable copy of an existing multiparty private offer and publish as a new one. Partners can use Clone on any multiparty private offer regardless of its status.

ISV partners can use the Upgrade option to upgrade an existing accepted multiparty private offer. Marketplace supports upgrades only at renewal. For example, the upgraded offer start and end dates can't overlap with the existing multiparty private offer. ISV partners can edit only pricing, dates, terms, and notification contacts for the upgraded multiparty private offer before sending it to the channel partner to finalize and send to the customer for acceptance and purchase. If other changes are needed, such as another plan, create a new multiparty private offer.

Multiparty private offers can't be upgraded mid-term. An ISV partner can create an upgrade at any time before sending it to the channel partner to finalize and send to the customer for acceptance. The upgrade takes effect only at the end of the existing multiparty private offer.

Yes. ISV partners and channel partners should use the same set of API calls to create a multiparty private offer for a customer.

Customers purchase multiparty private offers the same way that they accept and purchase private offers today through the commercial marketplace. For more information, see Purchase a private offer.

Any user within the customer's organization can see the details of the multiparty private offer. To accept a multiparty private offer, the user in the customer organization must be an owner or contributor of the subscription and an admin on the Azure account. For more information, see Roles and permissions. Without appropriate permissions, the user can't accept the multiparty private offer. To get access to the billing account, the user should contact the billing account admin or owner. A red notice at the top of the page indicates three people within the customer's organization who have the appropriate permissions to contact.

Yes. Customers are always invoiced in their billing account currency. For example, a Canada marketplace sale is in Canadian dollars.

There are two different locations and associated currencies that Microsoft tracks for the customer, market, and billing accounts. Microsoft determines a customer's market location and market currency based on the customer's tenant. Customers are shown offer prices in their market currency in the marketplace. The customer's Azure billing account settings determine the billing location and billing currency. Customers are invoiced in their billing account currency. Market currency and the billing account currency don't always match. For example, a customer located in Canada can have an Azure billing account set up with billing currency in US dollars. This customer sees offer prices in Canadian dollars based on their market currency. The customer is billed in US dollars for transactions they make based on their Azure billing account currency.

Offers with products configured with an absolute price for the partner price can't be extended to customers with mismatched market and billing account currencies. Only discount price (percent discount) partner price configuration is supported for these customers.

If the multiparty private offer is due to begin on the accepted date, the customer can go to the Azure portal to subscribe to the offer by using any Azure subscription associated with the billing account. They must use an Azure subscription associated with the configured billing account to get the private price. If the multiparty private offer includes pay-as-you-go offers (virtual machines) and was extended to an existing customer, the customer is charged by using the private price as soon as the multiparty private offer is accepted.

For a multiparty private offer that includes SaaS, the customer must subscribe to the SaaS product first and then configure the product within 30 days of subscribing to the product.

If the ISV configured the multiparty private offer to begin at a future date, the customer can accept the multiparty private offer before the accept-by date. But the customer shouldn't subscribe to or deploy the product until after the start date set for the multiparty private offer.

After the customer accepts the multiparty private offer, it can take up to 15 minutes for the private price to be reflected in the marketplace on the Private products details page. If the customer transacts within these 15 minutes, the marketplace still charges the customer correctly by using the private price. If the multiparty private offer is configured to start in a specific month, the customer doesn't see the multiparty private offer price. They don't receive the private price until that month.

Accepting a private offer doesn't initiate billing. Before billing begins, the customer must accept the multiparty private offer. Then the customer must subscribe to the SaaS product or deploy the virtual machine or Azure application product contained in the multiparty private offer in the Azure portal.

For a multiparty private offer that includes a SaaS product, the customer must also configure the product within 30 days of subscribing to the product.

After a multiparty private offer is accepted, it's a legal agreement between you and the customer, so it can't be changed.

If you need to change the multiparty private offer, you can submit a support ticket to cancel the current multiparty private offer and create a new one. To cancel the private offer, there must be either no purchases made by the customer for the products within the private offer or the customer must unsubscribe to the products purchased within the private offer before you can cancel it.

If the customer has autorenew enabled and you didn't create a new multiparty private offer that your customer accepted, your customer is charged the public list price of the plan they purchased.

Multiparty private offers created under customize public plans must be unique. They may not overlap with another multiparty private offer or customer private offer for the same customer billing account ID, using the same base plan, with overlapping private offer start and end dates regardless of the channel partner. Overlapping multiparty private offers are blocked at submission. To remedy this conflict, you have several options depending on whether the customer has already accepted the multiparty private offer.

• If the customer hasn't accepted the conflicting multiparty private offer and the status is currently pending acceptance, channel partners can select the offer and select Withdraw to withdraw the multiparty private offer. Then, ISVs and channel partners can choose to update the multiparty private offer for the customer or delete it after it's withdrawn. The ISV also needs to withdraw the multiparty private offer from the channel partner to edit their configurations or delete it.

• If the customer accepted the conflicting multiparty private offer, explore these options:

  • Use a different public plan and configure your multiparty private offer to the same customer with this different plan.
  • Create a new multiparty private offer that either customizes the pricing for SaaS plans or for virtual machine software reservations. Both types of multiparty private offers create a new plan with a unique plan ID during the private offer creation. In this way, overlapping conflicts are avoided.
  • Work with all parties on the deal, including your customer, to cancel the multiparty private offer before issuing a new multiparty private offer for the same public plan.

  

The SaaS fulfillment API is updated to return the private offer ID when a subscription is for a multiparty private offer. Follow these steps to verify:

1. Retrieve the subscription ID and plan ID as prerequisites. You can get them either through the Resolve option (when a purchase request comes to the landing page) or by way of the Get Subscription calls. Both choices return the correct plan ID in the response.

2. Call the SaaS fulfillment subscription APIs, and pass in the correct plan ID from the previous step. The response returns the multiparty private offer ID as the external ID if the subscription is for a multiparty private offer. For example:

   "sourceOffers": [ //sourceOffers is returned when planId is passed as filter parameter (note that this plan is the one that the customer purchased).
   {
   "externalId": "<guid>" //private offer ID, returned when purchase is made through private offer.
   }
   ]
   

Payouts to ISVs and channel partners follow the commercial marketplace payout schedules and processes. For more information, see Payout policy details.

Microsoft pays partners in the currency selected for their marketplace seller account payment profile in Partner Center. When the customer billing currency is different than partner payment currency, a foreign exchange conversion occurs. You can see this conversion in your Earnings workspace reports.

The standard commercial marketplace agency fee applies to ISVs on the partner price they configure for their channel partner. The standard marketplace fee isn't applied to the channel partner's markup. For more information, see Multiparty private offers.

Sales of multiparty private offers are available in Partner Center Earnings, under Earnings and Reports. Look for the column isPrivateOffer to determine if the sale is a private offer sale.

Multiparty private offer sales details are also available in marketplace insights reporting within the Revenue, Orders, Usage, and Customers dashboards, exports, and via programmatic access. Within the Revenue dashboard, partners can use the multiparty filter to view data specific to multiparty private offer sales. Within the marketplace insights reporting, ISVs have visibility to the customer, their products, and their partner on the deal along with the partner price they configured for their partner. Channel partners have visibility to the customer, the products, their ISV on the deal, the partner price they received from their ISV, the customer adjustment they configured, and the customer's price. For more information, see Access insights for the commercial marketplace in Partner Center.

To reconcile the Earnings report with the Revenue or Orders report, use OrderID in the Earnings report and purchaseRecordID from the Revenue or Orders report as the common unique identifier. For more information, reference the information in the data dictionary.