SOLVED: How To Change Office365 From Deferred to Current Channel

If you have Office365 Office 2016, by default you are running a product that is 4 months old.  This is called the Deferred Channel.  For a variety of good reasons you may want to change to the Current Channel:

1. Testing
2. Needing a new feature
3. Needing to eliminate a bug that has been fixed
4. You just like to live on the edge, like us at URTech.ca 🙂

To do this you have 3 changes to make; two changes in the Office365 Portal and one on any PC’s that you already have Office365 Office 2016 installed on.  Note that any PC you already have Office365 installed on, will NOT automatically change from Deferred to Current channel so read on!

STEP 1: Set The Office365 Channel via the Portal

1. Sign into Portal.Microsoft.com and make sure you are on the ADMIN page
2. Expand SETTINGS > SERVICES & ADD-INS
3. Click OFFICE DOFTWARE DOWNLOAD SETTINGS
4. Click EVERY MONTH (CURRENT CHANNEL) or EVERY 4 MONHTS (DEFERRED CHANNEL)

STEP 2: Set The Office365 Channel Scope via the Portal

This will be moved to the new portal at some point in the future, but as of March 2017, the only place I can find the settings is in the old portal

1. Sign into Portal.Microsoft.com and make sure you are on the ADMIN page
2. On the HOME page (top left of the left hand menu) click the Go to the old admin center link (at the top right of the page)
3. Expand SERVICE SETTINGS > UPDATES
4. Select ENTIRE ORGANIAATION or SELECT PEOPLE

STEP 3: Force Office 2016 Installs To The Correct Channel

1. Use the Microsoft FIXIT Tool which you can Download directly from Microsoft
2. See THIS post for more information on why Office365 does not detect channel changes

The process to move from Office365 Deferred to Current Channel is a little more complex that it could be but it is only supposed to be rarely changed and only by qualified administrators.