Microsoft Phone System Plans & Pricing Overview

Over the past few years, organizations have kept transforming their operations by improving how their employees collaborate using solutions such as Microsoft Teams. One-to-one calls are a critical way to get work done—in fact, nearly 80 million active users who place over a billion calls monthly in over 180 countries, rely on Microsoft Teams Phone to make calls richer and more collaborative.

As the future of work will increasingly take place in a digital landscape, MS Teams phone capabilities will continue to strengthen and evolve. This technology allows enterprises and small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) to fully adopt an innovative platform for communicating. If the next logical step for your organization is to modernize its phone system, you would be wondering what option is best for your business. In a previous article we delved into the two options you have to adopt Microsoft VoIP technology: Microsoft Calling Plans and Direct Routing. Read the full comparison here.

In today’s article we will do an overview of Microsoft Phone System plans and pricing to help you make the best decision for your organization.

Licensing requirements

Organizations need to hold licenses for Microsoft Teams, Audio Conferencing, and Phone System respectively to enable Microsoft Teams as their phone system.

Each user requires proper Microsoft 365 or Office 365 licensing, which can be purchased through a Cloud Solution Provider (CSP). We recommend you contact a CSP provider to get licensing guidance and more information to improve your investment.

Microsoft 365 E3

This license includes basic Microsoft Teams meetings capabilities, without Phone System and Audio Conferencing, which can be added separately. This license is priced at $32 user/month and requires additional fees for Direct Routing.

Microsoft 365 E5

The E5 license includes Microsoft Teams, Phone System and Audio Conferencing all bundled in. With the E5 license, enterprises have all the Microsoft licensing necessary to get started with MS Teams Direct Routing for $57 user/month.

Microsoft 365 F3

The F3 license is the most affordable option available, priced at $8 user/month. That said, this would be the go-to license for those organizations with limited budget that only want the basic features. Consider that Phone System and Audio-Conferencing licensing must be added separately.

Microsoft Phone System plans

Microsoft Domestic Calling Plan

This plan offers a basic service and is great for small organizations with less than 20 employees. Domestic Calling Plans includes admin technical support, 1 hr. response SLA critical, parked DIDs, and managed administration with additional fees. This plan is priced at $12.00 user/month.

BlueSky UC Direct Routing Plus

The most cost-effective plan considering benefits and pricing. The Direct Routing Plus plan is best for organizations with more than 20 employees and requires enterprise features and support. Through this plan volume pricing is available, as well as custom call routes and metered dial plans, admin technical support, call recording, parked DIDs, and analog device support. It is priced at $12.99 user/month, as low as $6.50 with volume pricing. Voice failover, enhanced reports portal, end user support, and managed administration requires additional fees.

BlueSky UC Direct Routing Premium

This is a plan that offers fully managed voice services through all features included. The enterprise package for Direct Routing integrates 30 min response SLA critical, voice failover, call recording, on-demand Microsoft 365 training with admin control and reports, managed administration, volume pricing, and admin technical support. Direct Routing Premium is priced at $22.99 user/month.

See more about Microsoft voice plans and pricing here.

Planning your deployment of Microsoft Teams Phone System is key to a successful implementation. To make the most out of your investment, please contact us. Our UC specialists with +12 years of experience on the MS voice stack, will guide you through your transition to cloud communications.