Microsoft has shared a detailed plan for signing up for Shared Calling for Teams Phone.

The solution intends to offer an alternative to accommodate organisations where some users don’t heavily use the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) for their calling needs and might not need a dedicated assigned phone number. As well as a simplified process, Microsoft says that shared Calling also reduces costs for an organisation because it removes the need for that dedicated assigned phone number for each user.

An accompanying Microsoft blog wrote:

For these users, you should consider Shared Calling as a simpler, easier-to-implement phone solution for your organization. Shared Calling greatly simplifies phone number management for some users.”

Instead of assigning a phone number to every user, Shared Calling admins set the phone number of a resource account associated with an Auto attendant for inbound and outbound PSTN calls. An Auto attendant “directs a caller to an appropriate person or department based on the caller’s input to the provided menu options — for example, dial by name or dial by extension,” as described by Microsoft.

The Shared Calling policy also configures the resource account utilised for outbound calls. Emergency numbers are also used as emergency callback numbers.

How to Configure Shared Calling

To configure Shared Calling for Teams Phone, admins must first assign Teams Phone licenses and enable users for voice before assigning a number to the resource account for inbound and outbound calling.

Admins must then associate the resource account with the Auto attendant for inbound calling and assign a location to the resource account for emergency calling. They then Assign a Pay-As-You-Go Calling Plan to the resource account with a Calling Plan service number.

They must assign and fund a Communication credits license, create a voice routing policy without PSTN usages, and enable emergency calling for users.

Lastly, they create a Shared Calling policy for the organisation and assign the policy to users.

Currently, Shared Calling can only be configured through PowerShell. Users must have Teams PowerShell Module version 5.5.0 or higher to use the new TeamsSharedCallingRoutingPolicy cmdlets. Users can leverage these cmdlets to produce and manage Shared Calling policies.

Teams Replaces Live Events with Town Halls

Last week, Microsoft revealed it was replacing Teams Live Events with “Town Hall”, a new one-to-many virtual experience.

Teams Live Events, which is now set for full retirement in September 2024, was built outside of the Teams meeting platform. Town hall will be integrated into Teams to streamline the user experience.

Town hall will be generally available for commercial customers from October 5, 2023, providing new features from the launch date, such as event roles, external presenter, digital video recorder, and integration with Viva Engage.

“Town halls in Microsoft Teams enable customers to extend their reach to scale their message and connect with audiences around the world; create professionally produced, studio-quality events that deliver a more dynamic experience; and structure and manage audience engagement to maximize participation and maintain focus on the event,” wrote Amber Waisanen, Product Marketing for Microsoft Teams at Microsoft.

Microsoft Changing Teams’ SIP Certification

Microsoft is changing Teams’ SIP certificate this week.

Teams is being switched to the new MSPKI Certificate Authority (CA). Following two successful tests on September 5 and 19, Microsoft will make the final switch to the new CA this Tuesday, October 3, beginning at 10 a.m. UTC.

The switch includes Microsoft Teams Direct Routing and Azure Communication Services Direct Routing SIP certificates. If an organisation’s Session Border Controllers (SBCs) aren’t aligned with the new CA, incoming and outgoing Direct Routing calls won’t be processed.

All Microsoft SIP endpoints will be incrementally switched to use certificates where the certificate chain will align with the “DigiCert Global Root G2” CA.



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