Microsoft Power Automate Reviews

Our primary use for this product is for the automation of manual tasks that may require some small integrations between systems. An example would be something like automatically sending an email from an action that is performed on our online system. Another might be writing data to our CRM database based on the input from an online form.  

The thing that this product has provided is a solution for quickly developing prototypes. We can create some new solutions really fast, test it to understand exactly which data is needed and then deploy the solution moving forward quickly through the process. That has been important for us. It is not necessarily that we all use Power Automate as a production-ready solution. It is more that we can use it to make prototypes that we can test with.  

I think the most valuable thing about this product for me is that it is really quick and easy to use. You do not need to have a lot of development skills to be able to create solutions. There is very little code involved, which is great, and it is very logical. It has also got great reporting. You can see the success and failure of each item that has been run through it. There are a lot of out-of-the-box connectors as well that make things easier.  

To improve the product, I think it would be great to see even more connectors available out-of-the-box and more maturity in that direction. I would also like to see some readiness for creating test and production environments so that you can differentiate which environment is you are working in.  

As far as additional features I am not sure what could really improve the product. It could maybe do with some more insights like triggered alerts.  

We have been using this product for about a year.  

So far we find that the stability of the product is really good. There is also good reporting if it is down for any reason. We have not really experienced stability problems or had any complaints about that.  

The scalability is really good. We have been able to use it for lots of different kinds of things. We do think that Power Automate is more for prototyping than for production-ready applications. You should probably upgrade to using Power Apps if you need something production-ready. You can build something quickly as a prototype in Power Automate and then upgrade to Power App to create a more refined application. Using those together means that what you develop is more production-ready. But in general, I think it is really scalable. There are lots of different use cases and lots of different solutions you can build and make available.  

There are not a lot of people currently using the product in the company — maybe like 10 or 12. We really want more and more people to use it, but it is not our job to roll it out to everybody. We just found it and thought it was interesting. We share it with people when they want to know how to try and automate something. But it is not something we had planned to really roll out company-wide as a solution initially.  

We will eventually roll it out to more people as we grow with it and discover more uses.  

We did not really use a different solution before Microsoft Power Automate. We were using Flow originally, which is what the same product was called before it became Power Automate. The name change was just within the last two months.  

The initial setup is really straightforward. It is immediately available out-of-the-box when you have Microsoft Cloud. You just click on the button and it is there ready to use.  

Our deployment took maybe a week or so. Most of that was just to play around and get familiar with it and become ready to start doing actual projects. Because you are building your own little mini-applications inside of it and the framework is available already, it is just a matter of learning how to work with the tool. You need to learn how to use it to build what you want to build.  

There were only two people involved in the deployment process. It did not require a lot of effort. It was just a couple of minutes to be ready to start using it and a week to get to the point where we could be productive.  

The framework for the product is maintained by Microsoft. Any applications that we build inside of it is all we need to maintain ourselves. So we do not have to maintain the framework at all.  

Power Automate is really cost-effective. You pay for use and if you want a premium connector then you just pay for a premium connector. But a lot of things are available for free. If you want to use an adapter that is not available for free, then you have to pay the provider for it. I do not know how much that costs.  

My advice to people who are considering implementing Microsoft Power Automate is that I think it is a really great tool that allows you to get started quickly on prototyping and integrating solutions that will simplify some redundant tasks. The best idea would be to just get started with it and experience what it can do.  

The biggest lesson we have learned from using Microsoft Power Automate is that there is just so much that is possible to automate. Thinking about the potential scope of what the tool can do, we now look at a problem and think that maybe we can use Power Automate to resolve the issue.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Microsoft Power Automate as a nine-out-of-ten at this point. To become a ten they would just need some more maturity with the test and production environments and making things more production-ready. Also, some additional guided help would valuable for new users to orient them and get started building their own applications. But other than that, it is perfect.  

We are implementation service providers and this is one of the products that we provide to our clients.

There are several use cases for this solution including automating tender processes, compliance-related processes, and in finance, we have automated some invoicing processes.

The most valuable feature is the ease of automation.

The development time for ProcessRobot is very good compared to other solutions.

There are some limitations when it comes to automation with Excel.

Better support is needed for building custom components on top of ProcessRobot.

We have been working with ProcessRobot for about one year.

The stability is okay. We haven't had any major issues, although there have been some hiccups here and there.

The scalability is good.

We have clients of all sizes, although ProcessRobot is best suited for small and medium-sized business, and not for enterprise-level customers.

Technical support for ProcessRobot is good.

We are working with UiPath and Blue Prism as well. We began with ProcessRobot at the end of last year, but the other two solutions we started with about two years back.

Generally, the development time is less when compared to UiPath and Blue Prism, although Excel automation is better in those solutions.

We have also worked with Automation Anywhere.

ProcessRobot does not support custom components, which is really bad because all of the other solutions do.

The initial setup is easy.

My advice is that this solution is good for small and medium-sized businesses that want to automate processes that do not require much coding. If there is a requirement for building custom components or custom modules then I do not recommend this solution. For an enterprise-level client, this capability needs to be there.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We use Power Automate to build applications for business users. Examples of this are workflow applications and business process applications. Sometimes, we need to copy data or get data from other systems and we try to use Power Automate to do some lightweight RPA work.

Power Automate has allowed us to simplify the business process and improve operational efficiency. For example, we used to manually copy data in Excel from one system to another. This solution automatically copies and manipulates the data between systems and files as we need it.

The most valuable features are the Flow and the UI Flow. Flow is used for workflow automation, and UI Flow is used as an RPA solution.

This product is very easy to use.

RPA has introduced a lot of new features include computer automation, AI, and third-party certified application integration. 

There is an RPA feature gap between this solution and other more mature products. UiPath is an example of another RPA solution that is more developed.

We began using Microsoft Power Automate almost one year ago, although it was rebranded only about two months ago. It was formerly known as Flow and they have added RPA features to it.

We contact Microsoft directly for support.

We also have experience with UiPath. They have been in the lead for several years and are very experienced in RPA.

This is a cloud-based solution and all you need is an account to use it. There is no initial setup. If you don't have an account or a subscription then you can just buy it online, which is easy to do.

We have our own team, in-house.

Power Automate is a new solution from Microsoft that provides business workflow features, application features, and RPA features. It is an all-in-one solution and if customers already use Microsoft Office 365 then they can directly and easily integrate it. Vertical integration is also a good choice because Power Automate makes it very simple to do.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for operations related to HR activity.

WinAutomation is very easy to use. It's a code three platform that works very easily with documents to create custom automations.

It also allows users to share their automations with colleagues, so users can send and receive automations quite easily.

At this time, I can't say the solution is lacking any features.

The solution could use some more advanced AI tools. It's one of the solution's only weaknesses.

I've been using the solution for the past three years.

The stability of the solution is very good. We've been very happy with it in general.

It's very easy to scale the solution, and at a very low cost as well. Scaling isn't expensive at all. 

Currently, we have nine users on the solution. They are all heads of departments.

We've been in touch with technical support often. I'd rate their support as excellent. We've been very satisfied with them so far.

We didn't previously use a different solution.

The initial setup is very straightforward. The products are basically plug-and-play in design. It makes it very easy to implement everything.

In our case, for deployment, it took us a month from trial to scale.

We handled the implementation in-house. Our internal team was able to manage the deployment.

The solution is relatively inexpensive.

We did evaluate other major players like Automation Anywhere, among others.

We're partners with Softomotive.

We're currently using the 2019 version of the solution.

I would recommend the solution to those who want to start exploring RPA and the benefit of RPA without investing too much money. It's a helpful way to get to know the technology.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for back-office activities and processing.

The ease of use is the solution's most valuable aspect. It's easy to configure and write code on it.

The solution is simple, it's not complicated.

The pricing of the solution is competitive, which is good for the Romanian market.

The solution could offer more specific training. There should be more examples of what the functions can do and more instructions and explanations to the process.

I've been using the solution for about one year.

The solution is relatively stable. I'd rate it seven out of ten.

The solution could be scalable, but it depends on the design process. Currently, I'm the only one using the solution in our company. I use it every day.

Technical support has been okay. They are quite prompt, but I was hoping they would provide more in-depth explanations concerning the process.

We didn't previously use a different solution.

The initial setup was straightforward. Deployment only takes a few minutes.

We handled the implementation ourselves.

We did a bit of market research before ultimately choosing this solution. Most of the information we found was in the public domain. We found that costs were transparent when looking at this solution.

The solution is web-based. We're partners with WinAutomation.

I'd advise others to be patient and learn how to program it properly. The results will come, but there will be a learning curve.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

The solution has drag and drop features, and a development console that's in simple English, so even a non-tech can understand what the code means.

It has controls in boxes, just like Automation Anywhere, which helps alert the developer to take care of the smaller-level details which reduce errors. It's a very good feature.

The solution is comparatively quick to deploy for making smaller automation processes.

The solution's recommendation feature needs improvement. So many times it fails, which tells us that although the hardware configuration and software configuration and the environment stay the same, we should expect the automation tool to recognize images correctly, but it does not. There have been issues in which it has failed, and it remains a concern. At times, it crashes, for some unknown reason. We avoid automating any complex automation processes. 

We find the solution to be not that user-friendly, and might be using the older version, which really did not have a lot of features, so my review is mostly based on the older version.

WinAutomation could work on a simpler process of providing a development of something that proactively tells us what is wrong in the code, because what is happening right now is that we make the scripting code in some other place and some other control, and we identify errors over there. We simply copy it to this control, which is not even providing any color-coding, or any other assistance to the developers. Copying it from elsewhere is necessary to pick up any errors with ease.

We were really fortunate to use the version which has extended the EXEs, so once we make a development in the studio and we compile it, and make an EXE out of it, that EXE can be used on any number of systems. When it comes to identifying images and creating logic based on those images, or moving the mouse to an image, the image recognition randomly fails for unknown reasons, although we've had a lot of assistance around it, and the developers have put a lot of effort to make a way around it, but when the image recognitions fail, it just stays on the system. 

It definitely is a scalable solution. The components that we use enable us to deploy as many  EXEs on the system as we would like. 

We have about four people working on the solution. In terms of execution, so the development team develops robots and creates and compiles EXEs, and the execution team actually executes manually. It is an assisted automation, it's not fully automated, so the trigger has to be done manually.

In terms of technical support, response times were not that great, and the technical documentation provided was very limited. There is no forum where one could read other experiences or share advice.

There was a community when WinAutomation formed, but eventually, when the older versions ended support it went away. 

We're pretty much left on our own to find solutions to problems at this point. They should at least provide documentation.

The initial setup is very straightforward.

It was easy to wait for the deployment of the mission tasks. It's a quick implementation. When it comes to complex processes, there's a lot of handoffs required, and that's when it becomes a little bit difficult to manage. I'm sure with the new version they have improved this feature.

How long deployment takes depends on the complexity of the processes and the amount of testing planned. It takes a couple of days for a smaller process, and possibly up to two weeks for complex ones.

We've used versions 4.0, 5.1, and 6.0 as well. We use the on-premises deployment model.

In terms of advice I'd give to others, I'd say, first of all, they should make sure they are implementing the most recent version, not the old version that I have used.

However, I'd suggest having a limited scope and to plan to work meticulously because if there is a bigger project, instead of making something wherein you're not able to reuse the components which you have already done for one project, and reuse it for the other project, a lot of time is wasted in copy-pasting code.  

I'd rate the solution six out of ten.

We are a reseller and ProcessRobot by Softomotive is one of the products that we implement for our clients.

This product is the best in terms of price and capabilities.

This solution should be more resilient, with robots more capable of recovering after an error.

I would like to see more native Microsoft integrations with cognitive solutions.

ProcessRobot by Softomotive

The pricing of this solution is very good and for me, it's the best option there is.

I would rate this solution a ten out of ten.

We are using it for approvals and flow history. We are using the latest version.

The approval feature is the most important feature. We also use the flow history feature.

It is a very useful product as compared to other products. We can automate easily when a list is updated. We can also handle approval-related issues and integrate it with emails.

It can have customizations like enterprise solutions. In the approval section, there should be an option to reassign approval to some other employee. It would be good if we are able to create custom tables by linking to an item, and there is an integration with the HTML table through HTTP calls or Swagger connectors.

I have been using Microsoft Power Automate for around three and a half years.

It is stable.

I don't know. We have only four users. 

I never contacted them. I am purely on the development side.

It is sometimes complicated and sometimes very easy. It requires integration with a lot of connectors, such as SharePoint, PowerApps.

I highly recommend this solution. I would rate Microsoft Power Automate a ten out of ten. I am a fan of this solution.