The Ultimate Guide to Microsoft Teams Calling

As remote work becomes the new standard, your communication tools need to keep up. You’re likely already using Teams for chats and meetings, but are you getting the most out of Microsoft Teams Calling? This guide is all about turning it into your go-to for clear, professional calls. We’ll cover the essential tips and best practices you need for effective remote collaboration, making every conversation feel seamless and connected, no matter where you are.

Getting Started with Microsoft Teams Calling

Before diving into the tips, it’s essential to have a solid grasp of the fundamentals of Microsoft Teams Calling. This section will cover the key features, functions, and benefits of this communication platform.

Microsoft Teams Calling provides a versatile platform for remote communication by integrating chat, calling, video meetings, and file sharing in one application. This multifaceted approach simplifies collaboration and enhances efficiency for remote teams.

Understanding how to navigate the interface of Microsoft Teams Calling is crucial for a seamless user experience. Whether initiating a call, setting up a meeting, or sharing files, knowing the basics will empower you to make the most of this powerful tool.

Exploring the various calling features such as call recording, screen sharing, and voicemail in Microsoft Teams Calling can significantly improve your communication capabilities. These features add depth and flexibility to your interactions, creating a more dynamic remote work environment.

How to Make a Call in Microsoft Teams

Once you’re comfortable with the interface, making a call is straightforward. Microsoft Teams gives you several ways to connect with colleagues, so you can choose the method that best fits your workflow. Whether you’re in the middle of a text conversation or need to look up a contact, initiating a call takes just a click or two. This flexibility is what makes it such a powerful tool for staying connected with your team, no matter where they are. Let’s walk through the four primary ways you can start a call so you can feel confident reaching out to your team members instantly.

From a Chat

Perhaps the most intuitive way to start a call is directly from a chat window. If you’re already messaging a colleague or a group to coordinate a guest’s request or discuss a patient’s file, you don’t need to interrupt your flow by switching screens. In the top-right corner of the chat, you’ll find clear icons for both a video call and an audio-only call. Simply click the one you need to instantly launch a call with everyone in that conversation. This feature is perfect for those moments when a quick text exchange evolves into a more complex discussion that’s better handled with a real-time conversation.

From the Calls Tab

For a more traditional phone experience, you can use the dedicated Calls tab. Located on the left-hand navigation bar, this area is your central hub for all calling activity. Here, you can access your contacts, view your call history, and check your voicemail. It also features a dial pad that allows you to call any phone number, assuming your organization has a plan that enables external calls. This is the go-to spot when you need to make a call to someone not in your immediate chat history or when you need to dial an external number to follow up with a vendor or patient.

Using the Search Bar

If you prefer using keyboard shortcuts to speed up your workflow, you can start a call directly from the search bar at the top of the Teams window. Just type /call, hit space, and then type the name of the person you want to reach. As you type, Teams will suggest contacts from your organization’s directory. Select the right person from the list and press Enter to begin the call immediately. It’s a fast and efficient way to connect with a colleague without ever needing to take your hands off the keyboard to click around the interface.

From a Profile Card

Sometimes you need to call someone you’re not actively chatting with, and searching for them feels like an extra step. You can easily find them in Teams and call them directly from their profile card. Simply hover your mouse over their profile picture anywhere in Teams—whether in a channel conversation, a comment, or your contacts list—and a small contact card will pop up. On this card, you’ll see icons to start an audio or video call, making it incredibly easy to connect with someone on the fly without navigating away from what you were doing.

Understanding Calling Plans and Costs

While calling other Teams users within your organization is always included, calling external phone numbers—like landlines or mobile phones—requires a connection to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). Microsoft offers its own Calling Plans to enable this, but many businesses opt for Direct Routing. Direct Routing provides greater flexibility, potential cost savings, and the ability to work with a specialized provider. This approach allows you to integrate more advanced call center features and create a more robust, tailored communication system for your specific industry needs, whether it’s hospitality, healthcare, or a large distributed enterprise.

Teams-to-Teams Calls vs. External Calls

It’s important to distinguish between the two main types of calls you can make. Teams-to-Teams calls are voice and video calls made to another person who is also using Microsoft Teams. These calls happen over the internet and are included with your Microsoft 365 or Office 365 license at no extra charge. External calls, on the other hand, are calls made to traditional phone numbers outside of the Teams environment. To make these, your organization needs a Microsoft Teams Phone license and a connection to the PSTN, either through a Microsoft Calling Plan or a Direct Routing provider.

Microsoft Teams Phone Plans

If you decide to use Microsoft’s native solution for external calling, you’ll need to choose one of their Calling Plans. These plans are add-on licenses that give users a monthly allotment of minutes for making outgoing calls. Microsoft offers a few different options to suit various business needs, from purely domestic calling to plans that cover international numbers. A key benefit is that all plans include unlimited inbound calls, so you never have to worry about the cost of receiving calls from customers, patients, or partners, which is essential for service-oriented businesses.

Domestic Calling Plan

The Domestic Calling Plan is designed for users who primarily need to call numbers within their own country. Each user with this license gets a pool of minutes to use for outgoing calls to landlines and mobile phones in the country where their license is assigned. This is a great option for businesses with a local or national customer base, such as a healthcare clinic serving a specific region or a hotel chain that operates primarily within one country and communicates frequently with local guests and vendors.

International Calling Plan

For businesses with a global reach, the International Calling Plan is the better fit. This plan includes the same domestic calling capabilities but adds minutes for making calls to phone numbers in 196 different countries. This is ideal for distributed enterprises with offices around the world or hospitality brands that need to communicate with international guests and partners without worrying about unpredictable per-minute rates. It simplifies billing by bundling both domestic and international minutes into a single, predictable monthly plan for each user.

Pay-As-You-Go Plan

The Pay-As-You-Go plan offers the most flexibility, especially for businesses with fluctuating or low call volumes. With this plan, you don’t get a pre-set bundle of outgoing minutes. Instead, you pay per minute for every outgoing call you make, drawing from a pre-funded account. Like the other plans, incoming calls are still unlimited and included. This can be a cost-effective choice for organizations that primarily receive calls, such as a central reservations line or a support desk, and only need to make occasional outbound calls to external numbers.

What is Minute Pooling?

One of the key benefits of Microsoft’s Calling Plans is minute pooling. If you have multiple users in the same country with the same type of calling plan, their minutes are automatically pooled together for the entire organization to share. For example, if you have 10 users on a Domestic Calling Plan with 1,200 minutes each, your organization gets a shared pool of 12,000 minutes for that month. This means high-volume users can draw from the pool created by low-volume users, which helps prevent overage charges and ensures you get the most value out of your plan.

Tips for Crystal-Clear Teams Calls

Ensuring a smooth and uninterrupted call experience is paramount for effective communication. Learn how to optimize call quality and troubleshoot common issues to enhance your interactions.

Factors like network stability, audio settings, and device compatibility play a vital role in maintaining high call quality. By addressing these aspects, you can minimize disruptions and create a more professional communication environment.

Regularly testing your audio and video equipment can help identify and rectify any potential issues before important calls. Paying attention to details like sound clarity and camera angles can drastically improve the quality of your virtual interactions.

Setting up a dedicated workspace with good lighting and minimal background noise can also contribute to better call quality. A conducive environment can enhance concentration and ensure that your message comes across clearly during calls.

In addition to technical aspects, establishing etiquette guidelines for calls within your team can promote effective communication. Encouraging active listening and clear speaking practices can elevate the overall call experience and foster better collaboration.

Use the Test Call Feature

Nothing derails the start of a meeting faster than the dreaded, “Can you hear me now?” dance. To avoid this, get into the habit of a quick pre-flight check before you join any important call. Microsoft Teams has a built-in function that makes this incredibly simple. As one expert recommends, “Always use the ‘make a test call’ button to check if your mic and speaker are working correctly.” This feature runs a quick diagnostic, playing a sound to test your speakers and recording a short clip of your voice to test your microphone. Taking thirty seconds to do this ensures your audio is clear and your equipment is properly connected, allowing you to join calls with confidence and focus on the conversation from the very beginning. It’s a small step that makes a huge difference in maintaining a professional and efficient communication flow.

Enable Noise Suppression

Your work environment isn’t always a quiet sanctuary. Whether it’s a barking dog, a nearby conversation, or the hum of a coffee shop, background noise can be a major distraction. Thankfully, Teams has a powerful tool to help you sound crisp and clear, no matter what’s happening around you. In your device settings, you can “turn on ‘Noise suppression.’ You can choose to block out general background noise or even isolate your voice from many voices in a room.” The high setting is particularly effective at filtering out non-speech sounds, ensuring that your colleagues hear you, not your surroundings. This is especially critical in professional settings like a patient follow-up call or a guest services interaction, where audio clarity is essential for building trust and avoiding miscommunication. Creating a distraction-free soundscape helps everyone on the call stay focused.

Set Your Availability Status

Your status in Microsoft Teams is more than just a colorful dot next to your name; it’s a critical signal to your colleagues about your availability. Using it correctly helps manage expectations and protects your focus time. Before you start your day or after you return from a break, “Make sure your Teams status is set to ‘Available’ to receive calls.” If you have it set to ‘Do not disturb,’ all incoming calls will go straight to voicemail without even ringing on your end. While ‘Do not disturb’ is perfect for deep work sessions, forgetting to switch it back can lead to missed connections. Being mindful of your status is a key part of digital workplace etiquette that fosters smoother, more efficient team collaboration by letting everyone know when it’s a good time to connect.

Use Call Scheduling and Integrations to Work Smarter

Discover how you can streamline your workflow and boost productivity by effectively scheduling calls, integrating with other tools, and leveraging Microsoft Teams Calling features to their full potential.

Utilizing the built-in scheduling feature of Microsoft Teams Calling can simplify the process of arranging meetings and calls with team members across different time zones. This time-saving function allows for efficient coordination and ensures everyone is on the same page.

Integrating Microsoft Teams Calling with other productivity tools like calendars, task managers, and email platforms can centralize your work processes. Seamless integration increases efficiency by providing a seamless flow of information and reducing the need to switch between multiple applications.

Exploring the collaboration potential of Microsoft Teams Calling through file sharing, whiteboarding, and note-taking functionalities can enhance team productivity. Leveraging these integrated features streamlines communication and fosters a collaborative work environment.

By optimizing your use of call scheduling and integration features, you can save time, minimize disruptions, and create a more streamlined workflow for remote collaboration. Embracing these tools fully can transform the way you work and interact with your team.

Leveraging Third-Party Integrations

While Microsoft Teams is a powerhouse for internal collaboration, its true potential for customer-facing industries is realized when you connect it with specialized third-party tools. Think about the unique communication demands in hospitality or healthcare—they go far beyond simple team chats and video calls. This is where integrating a more robust platform becomes essential. For instance, you can integrate Teams with a solution like BluIP’s AIVA Connect® to add sophisticated capabilities. This allows you to deploy AI-powered virtual assistants to handle guest inquiries, manage complex call routing for a multi-location enterprise, and gain deep insights from your call data, all while keeping Teams as your central hub. It’s about creating a single, seamless ecosystem that manages every conversation, whether it’s with a colleague or a customer.

How to Host More Engaging Virtual Meetings

Engaging virtual meetings require thoughtful planning and execution. This section will provide tips on leveraging Microsoft Teams Calling for interactive and impactful virtual meetings and presentations.

Designing an agenda and setting clear objectives for each virtual meeting can help keep discussions focused and productive. Utilizing features like screen sharing and virtual backgrounds can add visual interest and engagement to your presentations.

Encouraging participation through interactive polls, Q&A sessions, and breakout rooms can foster a sense of inclusion and collaboration during virtual meetings. These interactive elements create a dynamic atmosphere and encourage active engagement from all participants.

Incorporating visual aids such as presentation slides or shared documents can enhance the clarity and impact of your message. Using these tools effectively can make complex information more digestible and facilitate smoother communication in virtual settings.

Practicing good meeting etiquette, such as being punctual, taking turns to speak, and summarizing key points, can enhance the professionalism and efficiency of your virtual meetings. These simple practices contribute to a more positive and effective meeting experience.

Use Live Captions for Accessibility

Incorporating live captions during your Microsoft Teams calls is a simple yet powerful way to make communication more accessible for everyone on your team. This feature provides real-time text of the conversation, which is a huge help for participants who are hard of hearing or deaf. But its benefits don’t stop there. Live captions are also incredibly useful for anyone joining from a noisy environment—like a bustling hotel lobby or a busy open-plan office—or for team members who find it easier to process information by reading it. By making sure every word is captured, you create a more inclusive meeting where everyone can follow along and contribute effectively, regardless of their hearing ability or surroundings.

Turning on live captions is straightforward. During any meeting or call, just find the More actions menu (the three dots) and select Turn on live captions. The captions will immediately appear at the bottom of your call screen, providing a running transcript of what’s being said. A great aspect of this feature is that it’s a personal setting; when you enable captions, they are only visible to you. This allows each participant to customize their experience without affecting the view for others on the call. This personal control ensures that anyone who needs the support can get it discreetly, making it a comfortable and practical tool for daily use in any professional setting.

Microsoft underscores its dedication to accessibility by designing Teams so that the live captions feature cannot be disabled by administrators. This ensures that the tool is always available for anyone who needs it, reinforcing an inclusive-first approach to communication technology. By making features like this a standard part of the platform, it encourages organizations to build a culture where everyone has the tools they need to participate fully. When you utilize live captions, you’re not just improving comprehension for one call; you’re contributing to a more equitable and effective communication standard across your entire team, which is essential for industries like healthcare and hospitality where clear communication is critical.

Are Your Microsoft Teams Calls Secure?

Maintaining the security and confidentiality of your calls is crucial in a remote work environment. Explore best practices for safeguarding sensitive information and ensuring secure communication channels.

Implementing strong password protocols, enabling two-factor authentication, and regularly updating software are essential steps to enhance the security of your Microsoft Teams Calling sessions. These basic measures can significantly reduce the risk of unauthorized access.

Educating team members on the importance of data privacy and secure communication practices can help create a culture of awareness and vigilance. By promoting a security-conscious mindset, you can mitigate potential threats and protect sensitive information.

Utilizing end-to-end encryption for calls and messages adds an extra layer of security to your communications. This encryption method ensures that only the intended recipients can access the information exchanged, safeguarding your conversations from external eavesdropping.

Regularly reviewing and updating your security settings in Microsoft Teams Calling is crucial to adapting to evolving threats. Staying informed about potential security vulnerabilities and implementing necessary precautions can fortify the confidentiality of your calls and data.

Private Calls from Chats

Sometimes a quick chat turns into a conversation that’s just easier to have over the phone. Instead of scheduling a whole new meeting, Microsoft Teams lets you start a private call directly from any chat. This is perfect for those one-on-one discussions or small group huddles that need a more personal touch. These calls are completely private and won’t show up in your main team channel, so you can hash out details without cluttering the general conversation. It’s a simple way to move from typing to talking, making collaboration feel more immediate and connected, especially when you’re working remotely.

You have the flexibility to choose between an audio-only call for a quick question or a video call when you need to share screens or read visual cues. This feature is great for impromptu brainstorming sessions or detailed discussions with up to 20 people in the same video call. It’s important to keep that number in mind; if your group chat has more than 20 members, the calling options will be limited. This capability streamlines communication by allowing you to initiate a call with anyone in your organization right from where you’re already talking, fostering a more collaborative and efficient workflow.

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Advanced Call Management Features

Once you’re comfortable with the basics of making and receiving calls, you can start using the more advanced features that make Microsoft Teams a truly powerful communication hub. These tools are designed to give you more control and flexibility, helping you manage your calls with the same efficiency you manage your emails or chats. Think of them as your personal toolkit for handling any call scenario, whether you’re at your desk or on the move. From seamlessly transferring a customer to the right department to reading your voicemails on the fly, these features help streamline your workflow and present a more professional image to colleagues and clients alike.

In-Call Controls

Have you ever been on a call and needed to quickly ask a colleague a question, or realized another team member should be in on the conversation? In-call controls give you the power to manage these situations smoothly without fumbling or having to hang up and start over. These features allow you to pause, redirect, and combine calls directly from your call window. For busy professionals in hospitality or healthcare, where a single call can involve coordinating with multiple people to address a guest’s request or a patient’s need, these controls are essential for providing swift and seamless service.

Placing Calls on Hold

Putting a call on hold in Teams is more than just hitting the mute button. When you place a call on hold, the other person is notified that they’ve been put on hold, which feels much more professional than sudden silence. This gives you a moment to find information, answer a quick question from a coworker, or prepare for the next part of your conversation without the caller hearing any background noise. When you’re ready to continue, you can simply resume the call with a single click, ensuring a smooth and professional experience for everyone involved.

Transferring and Merging Calls

Transferring a call in Teams is straightforward and incredibly useful. You can send a call to another person in your organization, and you can even set it to ring back to you if they don’t answer, so the caller isn’t left hanging. This ensures every inquiry gets to the right person. If you’re on a call and another one comes in, you can merge them into a single group conversation. This is perfect for bringing a specialist into a client discussion or looping in a manager to help resolve an issue. For organizations with complex needs, like a multi-location hotel chain, integrating Teams with an advanced call center solution can provide even more sophisticated routing and analytics.

Moving a Call Between Devices

One of the best features for flexible work is the ability to move an active call between your devices without interruption. You can start a call on your laptop at your desk and seamlessly transfer it to your smartphone if you need to head to another room or leave the office. Just open the Teams app on your other device, and you’ll see an option to join the ongoing call there. This is perfect for a doctor who needs to walk from their office to a patient’s room or a hotel manager who needs to move around the property while staying connected.

Call Delegation

Call delegation is a fantastic feature for busy executives or team leaders. It allows you to choose a delegate—like an administrative assistant—who can make and receive calls on your behalf. When you set someone up as a delegate, they can see your call history and manage your calls directly from their own Teams account. This is built on trust, as your delegate will have full visibility into your call activity. It’s an ideal way to ensure your calls are always answered by a real person, even when you’re tied up in meetings, helping to maintain a high level of responsiveness.

Voicemail Features

Microsoft Teams has modernized voicemail, making it much more convenient than old-school phone systems. Instead of dialing in and listening to messages one by one, your voicemails are organized in a visual list right within the Teams app. You can see who called and when, and then choose which messages to listen to first. This visual interface saves time and helps you prioritize your callbacks more effectively. It’s a simple but significant improvement that makes managing missed calls much less of a chore, especially when you have a high volume of incoming calls.

Voicemail Transcription

One of the most powerful voicemail features is transcription. Teams automatically converts the audio from a voicemail into text, allowing you to read your messages instead of listening to them. This is a game-changer if you’re in a meeting or a noisy environment where you can’t listen to audio. You can quickly scan a message for key details, like a name or phone number, without having to play it back multiple times. This feature also creates a searchable record of your voicemails, making it easy to find important information later on.

Custom Greetings

A professional voicemail greeting helps manage expectations when you’re unable to answer a call. In Teams, you can easily personalize your greeting to fit your needs. You have the option to record a message in your own voice for a personal touch. Alternatively, if you’d rather not record your own audio, you can simply type a message, and Teams will use a text-to-speech voice to read it aloud for you. This flexibility allows you to set up a polished and informative greeting in just a few moments.

Call Forwarding

Call forwarding in Teams gives you complete control over where your calls go when you can’t answer. You can choose to have your calls forwarded to another person, like a colleague or delegate, or sent directly to your voicemail. You can also customize the timing, deciding how long your phone rings before the call is redirected. This ensures that no call goes unanswered and that every caller is directed appropriately. It’s an easy way to manage your availability and make sure important calls are always handled, even when you’re away from your desk.

Make Remote Work Easier with Teams Calling

By implementing these tips and strategies, you can enhance your remote work experience by harnessing the full potential of Microsoft Teams Calling. Remember, effective communication is the cornerstone of successful remote collaboration.

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s the difference between calling a coworker on Teams and calling an external phone number? Think of it this way: calling another Teams user is like an internal video chat that happens over the internet, and it’s included with your standard Teams setup. Calling an external landline or mobile number requires connecting to the public phone network. For that, your organization needs a specific plan, either through Microsoft or a provider using Direct Routing, to bridge that gap.

My audio quality isn’t always great. What are the first things I should check? Before you join an important call, always use the built-in test call feature. It’s a quick diagnostic that confirms your mic and speakers are working correctly. Also, check your device settings for noise suppression. Turning this feature to its high setting is incredibly effective at filtering out background sounds, so your colleagues hear your voice clearly, not your environment.

Can I use my Teams account to answer calls for my boss or a team member? Yes, this is exactly what the call delegation feature is for. A busy manager can designate you (or another colleague) as a delegate, which allows you to make and receive calls on their behalf directly from your own Teams account. It’s a great way to ensure important calls are always answered by a person, even when someone is tied up in meetings.

How can I make my Teams calling setup more powerful for customer service, like at a hotel front desk? While Teams is excellent for internal communication, you can connect it with specialized third-party platforms to handle more complex, customer-facing needs. Integrating a solution like an advanced call center platform allows you to add features like AI-powered virtual assistants to answer common questions or sophisticated call routing to direct guests to the right department, all while using Teams as your central hub.

What happens if I’m on a call on my computer and need to leave my desk? You can move the call to your phone without anyone noticing. Just open the Teams app on your mobile device while the call is active on your computer. You’ll see a banner at the top of the app that lets you join the call from your phone, and the transfer happens seamlessly without any interruption to the conversation.

Key Takeaways

Start calls from anywhere in Teams: Learn the different ways to initiate a call, whether it’s directly from a chat, the search bar, or a contact’s profile card, and understand the difference between internal Teams calls and external calls to phone numbers.
Ensure every call is crystal-clear: Use the built-in test call feature before you join a meeting to check your audio, turn on noise suppression to eliminate background distractions, and enable live captions to make conversations more accessible for everyone.
Manage your calls more efficiently: Take control of your communications with advanced features like call forwarding, delegation, and voicemail transcription, and consider integrating specialized platforms to handle complex industry needs in hospitality or healthcare.