Overview

This article covers the process to convert a Teams enabled phone into a Common Area Phone (CAP).  A Teams enabled common area phone is typically placed in an area like a lobby, kitchen, break room, or conference room, and can also be used for hoteling (hot desking). 

Common area phones are associated with a user account that's assigned a Microsoft Common Area Phone license.  The Common Area Phone license includes a license for Microsoft Teams and a Teams Phone Standard add-on license.  By itself, the CAP license does not include the ability to dial out to the PSTN.  For that you need a direct routing provider like Evolve IP, or you need to purchase a Microsoft Calling Plan to use Microsoft's gateway to the PSTN.

Planning for Common Area Phones

Some important things to know and understand when deploying common area phones. 

User Accounts & Licensing

• The Common Area Phone license can be purchased directly from Microsoft in the M365 Admin Center, from a Microsoft volume license reseller, or from a Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partner like Evolve IP.
• Teams enabled common area phones are associated with a user account, which is assigned the Common Area Phone license.  It is not a device license.
  • The user account should not be disabled or blocked from signing in.
  • The user account should have a complex password, and should not be assigned any admin roles.
• The Common Area Phone license includes a license for
  • Microsoft Teams
  • Microsoft 365 Phone System
  • Microsoft Intune
  • Azure Active Directory Premium P1
  • Exchange Online (Plan 2)

Common Area Phone Limitations

• Teams enabled common area phones cannot be used as a dial in bridge.  When you use a common area phone in a conference room, the phone is used to dial into the meeting organizer's dial in bridge.
• If you do not configure the user account with Teams direct routing or assign the user account a Microsoft Calling Plan, you cannot dial out to the PSTN, which means it cannot be used to dial emergency services (911, 999, 112, etc.).
• To properly configure a common area phone, you need to use PowerShell.  You can set up a common area phone in the Teams admin Center (TAC), but the TAC doesn't allow you to configure some important settings, and you won't be able to configure a common area phone for direct routing.

Common Area Phone User Experience

Some notes about the end-user experience with common area phones:

• If the phone's home screen is disabled, which is recommended, the main screen of the phone only displays the dial pad.
• There are no other options such as calendar or call history.  Voicemail will be available in a future update.
• If your configuration allows it, a user can use the phone to search the directory for other Teams users.
• After signing into the phone it will stay signed in even after a reboot or power cycle.  The user account associated with the phone should not be blocked from signing in.
• To sign the phone out you will need the phone's admin password, which is entered in the Admin Only menu of the phone.  The admin password can be set using a configuration policy in the Teams admin center.

Teams IP Phone Policy

Teams IP Phone policies manage features related to a Teams enabled phone including common area phones, which in turn, determine the phone's features that are available to users. 

There is a "Global" Teams IP Phone Policy, which applies to all Teams enabled phones including regular end-user Teams phones.  Therefore, instead of changing the global policy to configure a common area phone, you should create a new policy and assign it to the common area phone's user account.  Unfortunately, none of this can be done in the Teams admin center – it has to be done using PowerShell.

Teams IP Phone Policy Settings

Below are the Teams IP Phone Policy settings, and here are the PowerShell commands used to configure custom IP Phone Policies:

• Get-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• New-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• Grant-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• Remove-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy

Scenarios & Settings for Teams IP Phone Policies

This section covers the scenarios and the Teams IP Phone policy configuration settings for each scenario:

• Common area phones for general purpose areas (reception, kitchens, break rooms, etc.)
• Common Area phones for meeting areas (small meeting rooms and meetup areas)
• Phones for hot desking (shared desk or cube spaces).  Does not require a Common Area Phone license.

Common Area Phones - General Purpose

Common Area Phones - Meeting Rooms

Common Area Phones - Hot Desking

Create a New Teams IP Phone Policy

Make sure you have the latest version of the Microsoft Teams PowerShell module installed, and sign into your Microsoft Teams services.  PowerShell requirements and sign in details can be found in the Teams Direct Routing Planning and Prerequisites article.

PowerShell Command Reference

• Get-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• New-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• Grant-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy
• Remove-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy

View Existing Teams IP Phone Policies

Get-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy

Create a New Teams IP Phone Policy

###
### This example will create a policy for general areas and allow directory search.
###

$PolicyProperties = @{

    Identity                    = "EvolveIP-Common-Areas"
    SignInMode                  = "CommonAreaPhoneSignIn"
    AllowBetterTogether         = "Disabled"
    AllowHomeScreen             = "Disabled"
    AllowHotDesking             = $False
    SearchOnCommonAreaPhoneMode = "Enabled"
    Description                 = "General common area phones"
}

New-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy @PolicyProperties


###
### This example will create a policy for meeting areas and allow directory search.
###

$PolicyProperties = @{

    Identity                    = "EvolveIP-Meeting-Areas"
    SignInMode                  = "MeetingSignIn"
    AllowBetterTogether         = "Disabled"
    AllowHomeScreen             = "Disabled"
    AllowHotDesking             = $False
    SearchOnCommonAreaPhoneMode = "Enabled"
    Description                 = "Meeting area phones"
}

New-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy @PolicyProperties


###
### This example will create a new policy for hot desking with a 6 hr timeout.
###

$PolicyProperties = @{

    Identity                       = "EvolveIP-HD-Sales"
    SignInMode                     = "UserSignIn"
    AllowBetterTogether            = "Enabled"
    AllowHomeScreen                = "EnabledUserOverride"
    AllowHotDesking                = $True
    HotDeskingIdleTimeoutInMinutes = 360
    SearchOnCommonAreaPhoneMode    = "Disabled"
    Description                    = "Hot desking users in sales dept."
}

New-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy @PolicyProperties

Delete a Teams IP Phone Policy

Remove-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy "EvolveIP-Common-Areas"

Assign a Teams IP Phone Policy to a User Account

Grant-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy "cap-kitchen@contoso.com" -PolicyName "EvolveIP-Common-Areas"

Remove a Teams IP Phone Policy from a User Account

Grant-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy "cap-kitchen@contoso.com" -PolicyName $null

Configure for Teams Direct Routing

In this section we will configure the user account assigned the Common Area Phone license for Teams Direct Routing and assign the Teams IP Phone Policy.

PowerShell Command Reference

• Get-CsOnlineVoiceRoutingPolicy
• Grant-CsTeamsUpgradePolicy
• Grant-CsOnlineVoiceRoutingPolicy
• Grant-CsTenantDialPlan
• Get-CsOnlineUser
• Set-CsPhoneNumberAssignment

Get the name of the Evolve Voice Routing Policy, which will be entered into the below block of PowerShell code.

Get-CsOnlineVoiceRoutingPolicy | Where { $_.Identity -like "*Evolve*" }

Get the name of the Evolve Tenant Dial Plan, which will be entered in the below block of PowerShell code.

Get-CsTenantDialPlan | Where { $_.Identity -like "*Evolve*" }

Get the name of the Evolve Teams IP Phone Policy, which will be entered in the below block of PowerShell code.

Get-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy | Where { $_.Identity -like "*Evolve*" }

Provision the CAP for Direct Routing

# Enter the name of the Evolve voice routing policy
$VrPolicyName = "EvolveIP-USEast"

# Enter the name of the Evolve tenant dial plan
$TdpPolicyName = "EvolveIP-TenantDialPlan"

# Enter the name of the Evolve Teams IP phone policy
$TipPolicyName = "EvolveIP-Common-Areas"

# Enter the CAP's user principal name
$UPN = "user@domain.com"

# Enter the CAP's telephone number (no spaces, dashes, or parentheses)
$Phone = "+16105551234"


### Begin User Provisioning ###

# This will check if the CAP's account coexistence mode is set to TeamsOnly for Direct
# Routing. If it is not set to TeamsOnly, it will be set.
 
If ((Get-CsOnlineUser $UPN).TeamsUpgradeEffectiveMode -ne "TeamsOnly") {
  Grant-CsTeamsUpgradePolicy -Identity $UPN -PolicyName UpgradeToTeams
}

# The following will configure the CAP's account for direct routing and add the account
# to the voice routing policy, the tenant dial plan, and the Teams IP phone policy.  

Set-CsPhoneNumberAssignment -Identity $UPN -PhoneNumber $Phone -PhoneNumberType DirectRouting 
Grant-CsOnlineVoiceRoutingPolicy -Identity $UPN -PolicyName $VrPolicyName
Grant-CsTenantDialPlan -Identity $UPN -PolicyName $TdpPolicyName
Grant-CsTeamsIpPhonePolicy -Identity $UPN -PolicyName $TipPolicyName

### End User Provisioning ###