Can GitHub Copilot Agent (Jira integration) use a branch specified in the Jira issue description?

[askpaisa]

Description

I am using GitHub agentic workflow and want to control which branch the agent operates on.

Use Case

In our setup, users provide instructions directly in the Jira issue description. For example:

Branch instruction:
Use existing branch: feature/abc-123-my-change

Please apply all code changes against this branch.
Do not create a new branch unless required.

Expected Behavior

1. The agent reads the Jira issue description
2. Extracts the branch name (feature/abc-123-my-change)
3. Checks out that branch
4. Applies all code changes on top of it
5. Creates or updates a PR using that branch

Current Understanding

From the documentation, it seems:

The agent can read Jira issue content (title, description, comments, etc.)
There is support for branching rules defined via Jira

However, it is not clear whether:

These rules only apply when creating a new branch, or
The agent can reuse and checkout an existing branch specified in the Jira issue

Questions

• Is it supported to control the working branch via Jira issue description?
• Can the agent explicitly use an existing branch mentioned in the issue?
• Are Jira “branching rules” limited to naming new branches only?
• Is there a recommended pattern to pass branch context from Jira to the agent in a deterministic way?

[pelikhan]

/scout

[pelikhan]

@copilot add an FAQ explaining how to use create-pull-request.branch-name to handle this case.