Tools and Services

Welcome to Microsoft Forms 

Microsoft Forms is a versatile tool for effortlessly creating surveys, quizzes and polls. When integrated with Microsoft SharePoint, PowerApps and Flow, it enables you to develop solutions for gathering information, automating processes and defining workflows to manage data and send notifications efficiently. The tool can be used for:

• Survey responses in a data-friendly format (Excel sheet)
• Quick creation, sending and sharing of surveys
• Questionnaire options to build survey are simple to understand but allow for higher complexity forms/surveys
• Useful data on response details
• Supports for multilingual options
• Ability to preview surveys in desktop and mobile views

Features and Benefits

Multi-Language Forms - Forms gives you the option to create alternate versions of your forms, tailored to your diverse audience. You can overcome language barriers by interacting with your form's recipients in their own language. In addition, using multi-language forms to interact with diverse groups improves the quality and quantity of your results.

Real-Time Integration With Excel - Another great Forms feature is its ability to blend with MS Excel. Both Forms and Excel are part of Microsoft 365 applications. This means you can link your Microsoft Forms survey or quiz to an excel spreadsheet. When you link the two applications together, after someone responds to your survey, excel will automatically collect their answers and update the results in real-time.

Branching in MS Forms - Branching is when you give a user two or more options to choose from. Each option on the list has a pre-set action/event that should follow after the user picks it. In Forms, you can use branching to guide a user to the section that holds what they need. Using branching in Microsoft Forms, makes sure you get the right responses from the right people in the right places.

Math Keyboard - On a standard keyboard, there are some characters and symbols that are difficult to find. Sometimes you have to use complicated key combinations, like AltKey+251, just to type in a simple square root. Microsoft solved this problem by adding a virtual math keyboard into Microsoft Forms. So when you need to write some equations into your forms, all you have to do is choose the math option, click on your keyboard icon, and start typing.

Email Submission Notifications - You can enable email notifications for each completed form submission by selecting the "Get email notification of each response"checkbox. This feature will send you an email every time a response is received. Note that this email notification only works for personal forms; for group forms, you will need to create a workflow via Power Automate to be alerted via email.

Anonymous Submissions - By default, it captures the first and last name + email address of the users submitting the form. However, sometimes there might be a requirement to keep entries anonymous. You can easily do that by unchecking the “Record name” checkbox.

File Attachments - The file attachment feature allows users to submit files along with their form responses. These attachments are stored in the /Apps/Microsoft Forms folder in OneDrive if the form is created by or belongs to an individual user. For group forms, the attachments are stored in the /Apps/Microsoft Forms folder within the default document library on a SharePoint site.

As a reminder, if you currently have patient data in Microsoft Forms, be sure to export the data to a secure location and delete all protected data. All forms that collect protected information are required to reside in Qualtrics. 

To Access

Microsoft Forms can be accessed:

• Via the web version.
• At Microsoft 365 Office. Sign in with your university email address. Select the app launcher at the top-left under all apps or scroll down on the page to find Forms. 

• From the Microsoft store if you have a Windows PC.
• From the Microsoft Teams desktop app. If you have Teams installed, you can access Forms under Apps > All apps > Forms.

HIPAA Compliance for Microsoft Forms

The university has a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) with Microsoft that allows for secure collaboration and HIPAA compliance.

While Microsoft is configured for HIPAA compliance, you should use caution in the type of data is stored as well as with whom and how the data is shared (same university HIPAA policies and procedures apply).

HIPAA compliance depends on all of us. Please review the following information: