🧠 Business Central 2025 Wave 2: What UK Businesses Need to Know

Alex Hughes
4 hours ago
4 min read

Microsoft's Dynamics 365 Business Central 2025 Wave 2 release (rolling out from October 2025 through March 2026) brings a powerful blend of AI automation, financial visibility, and localisation flexibility — all designed to help UK businesses operate more efficiently, stay compliant, and scale intelligently.

Whether you're a growing SME or a larger enterprise with complex financial operations, this release delivers new tools that directly address common pain points — from manual invoice processing to VAT compliance and localisation challenges.

In this blog, we break down the most relevant features for UK businesses across three core areas:

🤖 Copilot & AI Agent automation
💼 Financial management enhancements
🌍 UK compliance & localisation

We’ll also compare feature value for SMEs vs larger UK enterprises and provide recommendations to help you prepare.

🤖 Copilot & AI Agents: Let AI Do the Heavy Lifting

One of the biggest themes of this release is AI automation. Microsoft continues to expand Copilot and AI-powered agents within Business Central, focusing heavily on reducing repetitive finance and procurement tasks.

Feature	Benefit to UK Businesses
Payables Agent	Automatically processes vendor invoices by scanning a monitored email inbox, extracting invoice data, and drafting purchase invoices.
AI-driven invoice to PO matching	Automatically matches received invoices with purchase orders - reducing reconciliation headaches.
Smarter field suggestions with Copilot	Autofills values during data entry based on historical context.
Improved AI agent oversight	Gives finance teams more control and customisation over how agents behave.

Why it Matters in the UK

For UK SMEs, these features mean fewer hours spent on manual data entry and more accurate processing — particularly helpful for lean finance teams. For larger organisations, AI-driven reconciliation and oversight controls support internal governance and scalability.

💼 Financial Management: More Control, Less Complexity

Wave 2 introduces targeted enhancements in the core finance engine, giving businesses better visibility, faster workflows, and tools that support regulatory needs.

Feature	Benefit to UK Businesses
Multi-asset creation from invoices	Automatically splits a single invoice into multiple fixed asset records. Great for equipment-heavy purchases.
Printable audit trail report	A new standard report linking G/L entries and registers, improving transparency and audit readiness.
Support for SEPA file format CAMT0530008	Helps UK firms doing business in the EU maintain banking compatibility.
Accounts Payable Role Center	A dedicated workspace for AP teams to focus on their tasks efficiently.

Why it Matters in the UK

The Audit Trail Report is especially important for businesses preparing for internal or external audits, including those facing scrutiny under HMRC standards. Combined with more automation and bank compatibility, these features position Business Central as an enterprise-grade financial platform — without the complexity.

🌍 Localisation & Compliance: UK-Specific Enhancements

Keeping up with changing UK regulations (like Making Tax Digital) and evolving VAT processes is no small task. Microsoft is improving how UK localisation is delivered, making compliance smoother and upgrades easier.

Feature	Benefit to UK Businesses
UK localisation delivered as an extension	Separates UK-specific functions from the core app, making upgrades faster and less risky.
Preview availability of AI Payables Agent in the UK	UK businesses can start using AI invoice tools earlier than many other regions.
Ability to resubmit VAT returns	A crucial addition for correcting errors post-submission, aligning with UK tax workflows.
Continued support for MTD, VAT Grouping, Reverse Charges, etc.	Solidifies Business Central's position as a HMRC-compliant ERP platform.

Why it Matters

These enhancements provide UK businesses with more flexible deployment, faster response to regulatory changes, and greater confidence in tax reporting.

🔍 Feature Relevance by Business Type: SMEs vs Larger Enterprises

We’ve created a simple comparison to help you focus on what matters most for your business size:

Feature	SMEs	Larger Enterprises
Payables Agent automation	High	Medium
Invoice to PO matching	Medium	High
Copilot field suggestions	High	High
Audit Trail report	Medium	High
Multi-asset invoice handling	Medium	High
UK localisation as extension	High	High
VAT Return resubmission	High	High
SEPA CAMT0530008 report	Low	High
AP Role Center	High	High

Takeaway:

SMEs should prioritise automation, compliance, and usability.
Larger enterprises will see big value in auditability, cross-border finance tools, and governance controls.

📌 How to Prepare Your Business

To maximise the value from this release, we recommend taking these steps:

Audit your manual processesIdentify where your team spends the most time on AP, reconciliation, and VAT corrections.
Train users on Copilot interactionsEspecially in finance roles — they'll need to know how to approve, edit, or override AI-suggested entries.
Update your localisation strategyMoving to the new UK extension model makes upgrades easier. Check if your system integrator supports it.
Prepare for new formats (like SEPA)If you do any Eurozone business, get ahead on SEPA compliance.
Test features during public previewThe UK is included in several preview rollouts — this is a great chance to test new AI functionality before full deployment.
Coordinate with your IT and compliance teamsEspecially around mailbox setup for Payables Agent, data governance for Copilot, and VAT workflows.

📣 Final Thoughts: More Automation, Better Compliance, Stronger Finance

The 2025 Wave 2 release of Business Central is a strong signal that Microsoft is doubling down on intelligent automation and region-specific compliance — without sacrificing usability.

For UK businesses, this is a great opportunity to: