Microsoft Teams can call another Teams user out of the box. It cannot ring a customer, take a call from a supplier or answer your main number until you connect it to the public phone network. There are a few ways of doing that, they are rarely explained before you are halfway through a quote, and the one you choose decides how much flexibility you keep afterwards.
The 30-second version
- Teams needs two things: a Microsoft licence for the user, and a route to the phone network.
- Direct Routing is the flexible option, and the one we provide from our own platform.
- Microsoft Calling Plans means buying minutes from Microsoft. Simple, usually dearer, and rigid.
- If you need queues and reporting, the answer is Teams alongside a contact centre platform rather than Teams on its own.
- Equipment does not move to Teams. Lifts, door entry and alarms keep their own connections whichever route you pick.
On this page
Why Teams needs anything extra at all
Teams began as a place for colleagues to talk to each other, and internal Teams to Teams calls have always been free and built in. Ringing an ordinary phone number is a different thing entirely, because it means getting onto the public telephone network, which Microsoft does not simply hand you.
So there are two separate things to buy. There is a Microsoft licence that adds phone features to a user, and there is the actual connection to the phone network with your numbers on it. People are frequently sold the first and are surprised to find they still cannot make a call.
The routes, side by side
| Route | Who provides the line | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Direct Routing | Your provider, connected to Teams through a session border controller | The flexible one. Any carrier, your existing numbers, and it copes with the equipment in your building. This is what we provide |
| Microsoft Calling Plans | Microsoft, as an add-on to your licence | Everything from one vendor. Simplest to buy, usually more expensive per user, and you are limited to what Microsoft offers |
| Operator Connect | A participating operator, chosen inside the Teams admin centre | Only works if the provider you want is on Microsoft’s participant list, which rules out most independent providers |
A note on Operator Connect
It exists, and for very large organisations already committed to one of the participating carriers it can be convenient. For most businesses it narrows the field to a handful of operators before you have even discussed what you need, which is why it rarely ends up being the right answer.
All of them look identical to the person using Teams. They dial a number and it rings. The difference is who supplies the line, what it costs, how much you can change later and who you ring when something is wrong.
Direct Routing, and why we use it
Direct Routing connects a provider’s platform to your Teams tenant through a session border controller. It is the route we provide, and we run the platform ourselves rather than reselling somebody else’s, which is the reason we can be flexible about what goes on it.
In practice that means the parts businesses actually care about stay open:
- You keep your numbers. They port across the same way they move between any two providers, including your main number and any direct dial ranges.
- You are not locked into a calling bundle per user. Calls are priced as calls, which changes the economics once you are past a handful of people.
- It copes with the awkward things. Lifts, door entry, alarms and card terminals do not live in Teams, and we connect those separately rather than pretending the problem does not exist.
- The session border controller is ours. There is nothing for you to buy, configure or maintain, and nothing new in your comms cupboard.
- One number to ring. When a call quality problem appears, you are not being passed between Microsoft and a carrier who each say it is the other one.
The question worth asking any provider
If somebody quotes you Direct Routing, ask whose session border controller it is, who configures it and who you ring when a call drops. Those three answers tell you far more than a feature list does.
Where Microsoft Calling Plans fit
Worth covering honestly, because for some businesses it is genuinely the right answer. You buy a bundle of minutes from Microsoft alongside the phone licence, and Microsoft is effectively your phone company.
It suits very small setups, and businesses that want one vendor and one bill above everything else. The trade-offs are that the per user cost is usually higher than buying calls from a telecoms provider, country availability is limited, and anything slightly unusual gets the answer no. There is also nobody to ring who knows your building.
If you need queues, reporting and routing
Teams has call queues and auto attendants, and for a team answering a manageable volume that is often enough. Once you need real visibility of what is happening, several channels in one place, or routing that goes beyond ringing a group, you have outgrown what Teams does on its own.
At that point the answer is not to abandon Teams. It is to put a contact centre platform alongside it, so agents still work where they always have while the queueing, the reporting and the routing happen properly. We provide that route as well, so the calls, the platform and the support all come from the same place.
Before comparing contact centre quotes it is worth understanding how they are priced, because named and concurrent user models produce very different numbers for the same team. Our guide to how contact centres bill goes through it.
How to decide without a long meeting
- Start with what you already have. An existing carrier contract with time left on it usually points at Direct Routing, because the alternatives mean paying to leave it.
- Count the things that are not people. Lifts, door entry, alarms, fax lines and card terminals never move to Teams. If you have several, you need a route that deals with them.
- Check how many people genuinely need external calling. Licensing everybody when half the business never rings an outside line is the most expensive mistake in a Teams migration.
- Decide whether you need a contact centre. Queues and reporting beyond the basics mean Teams plus a platform, not Teams alone.
- Get the number porting plan agreed before you commit. Moving numbers is covered in our guide to moving numbers into Teams.
Where Teams calling is not the answer
Worth saying plainly, because the enthusiasm around Teams tends to skip it. Teams calling suits businesses whose people already live in Teams and who mostly make ordinary calls. It is a weaker fit for high volume contact work on its own, for sites with a lot of analogue equipment, for businesses not already on Microsoft 365, and anywhere people need proper cordless handsets rather than a laptop and a headset.
None of those rule it out. They mean the answer is Teams plus something else rather than Teams instead of everything, and it is much better to know that at the start than to discover it after the numbers have moved.
Not sure which route you need?
Tell us what phone system you have now, when the contract ends and roughly how many people actually ring outside numbers. That is normally enough for us to tell you what fits and what it would involve, including whether you need a contact centre alongside it.