Scheduling Meetings using the Amazon Chime Add-in for Outlook

If you are using Outlook this article explains how to schedule Amazon Chime meetings. There are a lot of details provided below to help explain all the options, and most meetings are scheduled in just a few clicks.

Note: If you are scheduling meetings for someone else and you use Outlook on Windows, please see this article: https://amazonchime.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/38961398180379-Scheduling-a-meeting-for-someone-else-using-Outlook-for-Windows 

UPDATE 09/26/2023 Options were changed and the article was updated to support the Amazon Chime Waiting Room scheduling changes.

UPDATE 01/26/2023 The Amazon Chime for Outlook Add-in now provides an option to select the meeting invite language used: English or Canadian French when scheduling a meeting. The option will be remembered when scheduling the next meeting.

UPDATE 11/16/2020 If you are scheduling meetings for someone else and you use Outlook on Mac, there was a change to the experience after the macOS Outlook 16.42 client update. You can either ask your delegate to provide you with meeting IDs that you can use when scheduling meetings on their calendar or use Outlook on Windows.

Scheduling meetings

1. Contact your IT department for instructions on how to enable the Amazon Chime Add-in for Outlook.
2. Launch Outlook and create a new Appointment or open an existing Appointment.
3. Select Schedule Chime Meeting found on the upper right of the Appointment ribbon. The Amazon Chime add-in will load from the right.
   
4. If you are launching the add-in for the first time you will be prompted to Sign in.
5. Choose your options listed below and when done click Add to invite. Amazon Chime will remember the options you choose and present them the next time you access the Meeting scheduling assistant - unless the option is set to always default to a particular option.

   1. Meeting ID section

      Select either to generate a new ID your personal meeting ID. We highly recommend choosing one of the Generate a new ID meeting types. The personal meeting ID was assigned to you when you created your Amazon Chime account and it is best used for adhoc personal meetings.

      If you are scheduling back to back meetings, external, or confidential meetings, choose the Generate a new ID option. Amazon Chime generates a special 10-digit meeting ID that you can use for a single meeting event or for a recurring series. There is no limit to how many new IDs you can generate.

      If you are scheduling a confidential meeting and you want to add a passcode that can be used to start the meeting or share host controls (for instance so another attendee can record the meeting), choose the Generate a new ID and require moderator to start. For more information about moderated meetings, please see this article.

      Note: You can also give your personal meeting ID a friendly name by navigating to Meetings and choosing My meeting bridge information from the menu and clicking on your Personalized ID.

   2. Security section

      Decide who can join your meetings directly and who can skip the Waiting Room.

      Registered users whose Amazon Chime account is associated with an email that was invited to the meeting along with meet@chime.aws are always allowed to join the meeting. Attendees in the same company (based on the Amazon Chime account that the organizer belongs to) can also join directly.

      Check the Attendees outside of my company who are signed in option, so anyone registered with an Amazon Chime account who knows the meeting ID joins directly and doesn't wait

      Check the In-room video systems to allow attendees to join from conference room equipment. If you do not check the In-room video systems option, attendees joining from a conference room will be LOCKED out!

   3. Dial in-audio section
      Decide if you want to include Dial-in numbers in the meeting invitation and choose which numbers to include.
      
      Note: Amazon Chime generates a unique 13-digit meeting ID for each invited attendee when the meeting begins which can be used to dial into a meeting when joining. An invited attendee signed into Amazon Chime may obtain their 13-digit meeting ID by choosing the Dial-in tab from the device preview panel when first joining the meeting from a client or by choosing the Switch to dial-in option from the audio menu on the lower call controls from Windows, macOS or the web applications.
      
       
6. Choose Add to invite and the add in will invite meet@chime.aws and the pin+<meeting id>@chime.aws to the To: field of the invite and adds meeting join information to the Body of the invite.
7. Next complete your meeting invite by adding additional attendees, Subject (meeting name), Start and End date and time, recurring schedule, etc.
    
8. When the meet@chime.aws and pin+<meeting id>@chime.aws email addresses are included in the invite, the meeting .ics file is communicated to Amazon Chime to use to initiate the auto-call and help attendees join.
    
9. A minute before the scheduled meeting starts, Amazon Chime will "ring" all registered Amazon Chime attendees who were invited to start the meeting. Other attendees can use the meeting link, and optional dial-in and in-room video system information to join the meeting.
    
10. If there is a problem with scheduling your meeting, (e.g. The meeting ID is not associated with the calendar owner, the calendar is a group calendar, the organizer does not have a Pro license), Amazon Chime will send a scheduling failure email to the organizer.

Meeting Scheduling Best Practices:

1. If you want attendees to receive auto-call, expand distribution lists.
    
2. If you add or remove attendees from a meeting invite, make sure you choose the option to Send update to all. If you don't do this, not all your attendees will receive the auto-call.
   
3. If you remove the meet@chime.aws from the invite, Amazon Chime doesn’t know who is invited, the name of the meeting, when it starts, or when it ends. No auto-call will happen and attendees join manually (clicking on the link, or entering the meeting ID). In addition, the security option Anyone in your company or is invited does not include invited attendees outside your Amazon Chime company and external registered attendees may need to be manually added to the meeting by choosing More > Invite others.
   
   Organizers may choose not to invite meet@chime.aws because they are trying to reduce the meeting start notification from being played on all the attendee's devices (especially if they are in one location).
    
4. Once options are set for a meeting ID, they cannot be changed - including during a meeting or on a future occurrence.