Microsoft Office 365 Calling

What is Microsoft Office 365 Teams Calling?

A simple, scalable landline and mobile calling within Microsoft Office 365

You might have heard over the past few years or that Microsoft have released some new functionality which allows you to be able to make outbound calls using Microsoft Teams. You had previously only been able to make Audio and Video calls to people that have been added to your Microsoft Teams Environment and no outbound calls.

With the introduction of Microsoft Office 365 Teams Calling, you will be able to replace your current phone system, whether it be on-premises or fully hosted with a Phone System that is an extension of your Office 365, with full PBX capabilities, once a Calling Plan has been setup, your staff will have full outbound calling capability to regular phones and mobiles, both local and overseas.

You will need to have an active Microsoft Office 365 subscription E1 or E3 license, a phone system license and a calling plan, or an Office 365 Enterprise E5 plan, which has a Phone System add-on included.

Some telecommunications providers have SIP connections which integrate with Microsoft, this enables businesses to use their Microsoft collaboration environment inclusive of Skype for Business and Microsoft teams to dial out and call landlines and mobile numbers outside of their organisation without the need to use a separate telecommunications provider and phone systems to make these calls.

You get all the benefits of a Hosted PBX system (cloud based phone system) for telephony, combined with the Microsoft Collaborative environment.

This phone system integration, empowers your staff to work more effectively by integrating with the collaborative tools such as Skype and Microsoft Teams that they are already using, providing them a consistent and intuitive user experience.

In its simplest form, your organisation might only have some basic desk-phones (or mobile apps) which would be integrated to a cloud based Microsoft and phone system environment.

The end user would be able to use their computer, desk phone or mobile phone, with internet connectivity and be able to make outbound and internal calls using Microsoft Teams.

 

 

Some additional benefits:

• Assuming you are already using Microsoft Teams, the change management and on-boarding process is quite easy. For users that don’t already have Microsoft Teams, the interface is quite intuitive.
• You can keep your existing landline numbers allowing for full phone number portability and the ability for your business to make and receive calls via one business number or from multiple extensions. New numbers can also be allocated as required.
• If hardware is required ie handsets or headsets, minimal investment is required in comparison to a traditional on-premise phone system in that there is no PBX on site, with Microsoft Office 365 Teams Calling hardware investment is entirely optional i.e you can utilise existing computers and mobile devices
• Highly scalable, easy to manage and cost effective
• Create a more unified and productive workspace, bring all collaboration technology and tools together in one single future ready environment
• Improved security and compliance, due to reduced number of systems and infrastructure and leveraging off the security of Microsoft’s applications and data centres.

 

Next Steps, need help setting up a Microsoft Office 365 Calling environment for your organisation?

In order to determine if your business is ready to deploy Microsoft Office 365 Teams calling , there are a number of things to assess and consider, to ensure your implementation is a success:

• Complete a network assessment to check your bandwidth is sufficient for voice and video calls
• Assess what your end user device requirements, compatibility and how ready your are to deploy
• Determine which Calling Plans are required for your users and organisation, and associated licenses and plan the setup, along with some initial change management preparation to advise the business that a new telephony system will be implemented.
• Setup extensions and Port your phone numbers
• Complete end user training and complete change management process. To minimise disruption, it is critical that your staff have the training that they need to make good use of the technology.

If you need assistance or need some advice with Microsoft Office Teams Calling give us a call on 1300 978 973. Circle Business Consulting  have helped businesses all over Australia solve technology related issues, we have delivered phone system solutions in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Hobart, Adelaide, Canberra, Perth, Tasmania, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia.