The dependency pyramid
Copilot answers ("what did I miss?")
Intelligent recap (chapters, action items)
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TRANSCRIPT (speaker-attributed text)
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AllowTranscription = true + language set right
(organizer's policy — per instance, remember 7-of-11)
Everything AI in a meeting consumes the transcript. The failure taxonomy is therefore
short: licence missing (Copilot seat / Premium for recap), policy blocking
(AllowTranscription false on the organizer's policy instance), nobody started
transcription (it isn't always automatic — 'Copilot without transcript' mode exists
but with reduced, during-meeting-only behaviour), or e2ee meeting (no service-side
media, no transcript, no AI — by design, see meeting security).
Who gets what
| Artifact | Needs | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Live captions | Base | Ephemeral unless transcription on |
| Transcript | Transcription allowed + started | The load-bearing artifact |
| Intelligent recap | Premium OR Copilot | Chapters, mentions, action items post-meeting |
| Copilot in-meeting | Copilot licence | Asks against the running transcript |
| Copilot after meeting | Copilot licence | Available as long as the transcript exists |
Governance corollary: transcript retention = AI-answer retention. Delete the transcript (retention policy, manual, or expiry) and recap/Copilot for that meeting die with it. Conversely, holds that freeze transcripts freeze what Copilot can be asked about — eDiscovery teams should know transcripts are in scope like any artifact.
Data-boundary answers for the inevitable meeting
- Prompts and transcripts are processed within the Microsoft 365 service boundary under your tenant's terms — not used to train foundation models.
- Copilot answers inherit MEETING access: someone not in the meeting can't Copilot its content; someone in it can't extract more than the transcript they could read anyway (chat-copy restrictions — Premium — narrow even that).
- Admin off-switches exist at each layer: transcription policy, recap availability, Copilot licensing/assignment — you can run any subset.
What to watch (proofs)
- The pyramid's base, tenant-wide:
Get-CsTeamsMeetingPolicy | ft Identity, AllowTranscription— serv365's original verdict demo; the instance list IS the Copilot-readiness report. - A specific 'broken Copilot': does the meeting have a transcript (Recap tab)? If no — policy, licence, or never-started, in that order. If yes — licence on the asking user.
- Artifact lifecycle: transcript visible in Recap; its deletion (retention/expiry) removes recap content — test on a short-retention pilot before promising legal anything.
- Licence reality:
Get-MgUserLicenseDetailservice plans for Copilot/Premium on the complaining user — thirty seconds, ends most tickets.