Email us at sales@ocgl.net
Email us at sales@ocgl.net
Blog
26Aug 2026
Microsoft Teams Phone is the piece that completes the collaboration story. Once calls arrive in the same app as your chats, files and meetings, the last reason to keep a separate phone system disappears. Your desk phone, your mobile and your laptop finally share one number and one directory.
This post is Part 3 of a four-part series for owners and leadership teams. Part 1 covered the platform itself, and Part 2 covered meeting rooms and Copilot automation. Here we look at what Teams Phone does, how the four connectivity options differ, and what it costs in Canada. Part 4 then prepares for the migration.
Above all, Teams Phone is a cloud PBX, and it can replace an on-premises phone system outright. Crucially, though, the licence is the phone system, not the phone line. You also need a connection to the public telephone network, and that is a separate decision.
That single distinction causes more confusion than anything else in this space. Microsoft 365 E5 includes the PBX but not the dial tone. Microsoft 365 Business Premium does not include Teams Phone at all — it is listed as a prerequisite for the add-on, not a replacement for it.
In fact, the feature set is a full business phone system, not a stripped-down version:
One Canadian caveat on voicemail transcription. English (Canada) is not a separate transcription language and falls back to US English. French (Canada) transcribes using European French. Neither is a problem, but it is better to know than to discover.
Notably, Microsoft supports four connectivity models, and you can mix them in one tenant. That flexibility matters more than picking a single winner.
With this option, Microsoft becomes your carrier. As a result, it is the simplest path: buy the licence, port or acquire numbers, then assign them. Microsoft publishes a 99.999% reliability SLA for this service. For Canada, calls to the United States are treated as domestic, and toll numbers are available for Vancouver among other cities.
A certified carrier provides the lines, but you manage users and numbers inside the Teams admin centre. There are no session border controllers to buy or maintain. The operator handles connectivity, provisioning, porting and PSTN support. In Canada, Bell, TELUS and Rogers all list Operator Connect offers.
In this model, the user’s mobile SIM number becomes their Teams number, and calls work from the native dialler or from Teams. Bell launched it in Canada in November 2024, and Rogers offers it too. It is genuinely useful for field and sales staff, because the cellular path does not depend on the office internet connection.
However, there is a hard limitation. Teams Phone Mobile supports user numbers only. It does not support auto attendants, call queues or audio conferencing numbers. Therefore, any business using it still needs a second option for the main line.
With Direct Routing, you keep your own carrier and connect it through a certified session border controller that you, your integrator or a managed provider owns and maintains. Consequently, it offers the most flexibility and the most work. Microsoft supports certified devices only, and support escalates through the SBC vendor first.
For a typical Vancouver business of 10 to 150 seats with no unusual requirements, Direct Routing adds a failure domain you now own for little functional gain. That said, it is the right answer when you have analog devices, an existing carrier contract with real value left, or a contact centre that integrates at the network level.
| Calling Plans | Operator Connect | Phone Mobile | Direct Routing | |
| Carrier relationship | Microsoft | Certified operator | Mobile operator | You and your carrier |
| Setup effort | Lowest | Low | Low to moderate | Highest |
| Ongoing management | Microsoft | Operator and Microsoft | Operator | You |
| Auto attendants and queues | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Analog devices | No | No | No | Yes |
| Published SLA | 99.999% from Microsoft | From the operator | From the operator | Shared with you |
Fortunately, Microsoft publishes Canadian list pricing, which makes budgeting straightforward. Per user per month, on an annual commitment:
In addition, a separate Teams licence is required in all cases. For Operator Connect, Teams Phone Mobile and Direct Routing, no public rate card exists, so those figures come from a live quote.
Two cost savers are worth asking about. Auto attendant and call queue resource accounts use a free Teams Phone Resource Account licence. In addition, Shared Calling lets light users share a number from a resource account rather than each holding their own calling plan.
First, every assigned number in Canada needs a registered emergency address, and it is required at the moment the number is assigned to a user. All Canadian emergency calls are screened nationally before transfer to the local answering point.
Teams also supports dynamic emergency calling, which routes based on where the device actually is rather than where it was registered. That requires validated, geocoded addresses, trusted IP addresses, defined network sites, and populated location data for subnets, switches and access points. Usefully, you can dial 933 in Canada to test the configuration before you go live.
Two licensing traps catch people here. First, Teams Rooms Basic accounts are blocked from signing in to Teams Phone devices, and only Rooms Pro includes Teams Phone Standard. Second, the Teams Shared Devices licence was renamed Teams Shared Space in April 2026, and its cheaper Single Space variant does not include Teams Phone. Do not buy it for a lobby phone.
In short, Microsoft Teams Phone finishes what the platform started. One number, one directory, one admin centre, and calls that follow the person rather than the desk. For most Vancouver businesses, Calling Plans or Operator Connect is the right path, with Teams Phone Mobile layered on for people who live in their cars.
However, the technology is the easy part. Getting there without dropping a call is a planning exercise, and that is exactly where we go next.
Wondering whether Teams Phone can replace your current system, or which connectivity option fits your business? OPUS Consulting Group plans and delivers Teams Phone for organizations across Metro Vancouver and Canada, coast to coast, especially those with 15 to 70 people. Explore our Microsoft Integration and Managed IT Solutions services, or start a plain-language conversation: sales@ocgl.net • 1-866-800-OPUS (6787) • visit www.ocgl.net. Up next: Part 4 on preparing for a Teams Phone migration.
1-866-800-OPUS (6787)