Microsoft Calling Plans - Teams with a real phone number

To get this functionality you just need two things.
 
  1. The Phone System licence, is available as an add-on licence or bundled in Office 365 E5 – This unlocks the ability for the client to act as a phone, with advanced features including call transfer, multi-level auto attendants, and call queues.
  2. A Phone number and PSTN connectivity (line and minutes). PSTN is the Public Switched Telephony Network or the telephony network. The phone number can come from a Microsoft provided Calling plan that includes a bundle of minutes.
 
NOTE: Microsoft 365 Business Voice is an add on SKU to SMB (up to 300 users) Office 365 Plans that include all of the following in one licence:
Phone System + Microsoft PSTN Dial-in audio conferencing. More details of Microsoft 365 Business Voice here.
 
There are two options for purchase, direct from Microsoft or via ACME UC.
 
What are Microsoft Calling Plans?
Microsoft offers calling plans as a per-user licence. They bundle up a number of minutes and a phone number for users. All service is provided directly from Microsoft 365 with no additional PSTN carrier contract. These operate like a mobile phone contract in the UK and the calling tariffs can be found here
 
What Countries are Microsoft Calling Plans available for?
Microsoft offers calling plans for users in 16 countries. Note your Microsoft 365 tenant does not need to be homed in these countries, but the user must have their user licence country set appropriately. Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom (U.K.), United States (U.S.)
Microsoft also has direct partnerships with Telstra for Australia and Softbank for Japan. For Softbank your tenant must be in Japan.
 
How much do Microsoft Calling Plans cost and how many minutes are included?
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Microsoft offers Domestic and Domestic and International Calling Plans.
MCOPSTN1 – Domestic Calling Plan (3000 domestic minutes US/1200 domestic minute EU plans) – $12 per user per month
MCOPSTN2 – Domestic & International Calling Plan (3000 domestic minute US/Canada/PR, 1200 domestic minute Europe and 600 international minutes) – $24 per user per month
MCOPSTN5 – Domestic Calling Plan (120-minute domestic calling plan) – only available to specific organisations, no public pricing
MCOPSTN6 – Domestic Calling Plan (240-minute domestic calling plan) – only available to specific organisations, no public pricing
 
How do the minute caps work?
The minute caps are not actually per user but are bundled per plan, per country for each organisation. So if you have 3 users with MCOPSTN2 Domestic and International in France, those 3 users have a combined 3,600 domestic minutes and 1,800 international minutes. If another user in France has MCOPSTN1, Domestic plan, they have 1200 domestic minutes, but even if there are domestic minutes still available in the MCOPSTN2-France plan, once they have used all 1200 they go on to pay per minute. If you have a domestic and international plan, the plan is “used” when either the domestic or international minute total is reached, whichever is first.
 
How can I see where I am with my minute caps?
Teams Admin Center (TAC admin.teams.microsoft.com) has a preview minutes pool report image
 
Can I pay per minute?
There is no per-minute only plan, however, you can pick a domestic plan and pay per minute for international calls. You can also pay per minute if you go beyond your allocation of minutes
 
What happens when I run out of minutes?
Once you run out of minutes in your plan, if you have communications credits enabled, you can pay per minute for any overages. Communications Credits is Microsoft’s name for a pre-paid amount of money that can be run down per minute. This bucket of credit can be used in various ways, in the context of calling plans it is used to pay per minute for usage beyond the plan or for international calls on a domestic plan,
 
What are the per-minute costs for Communications Credits?
Microsoft lists the per-minute costs here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-teams/microsoft-teams-phone#office-StandaloneSKU-pkdogb9
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Where can I get an itemised bill?
There is an itemised bill available on the Teams Admin Center. It can be exported as a CSV. image image