In this post I like to describe how you can manage group calling and call delegation in Microsoft Teams as admin.

First of all, I’d like to explain what these two features can do for you or your users:

Group call pickup allows a Teams (phone system) user to select other Teams users to answer his/her call. E.g. Erik Doe get’s a call on his Teams phone number and his other co-workers which he added previously to his group pickup get a notification about the incoming call and can answer it instead.

Call delegation allows to configure delegation for your telephony, similar to what you might know for mail delegation. I.e. this enables you for typical and lightweight boss/admin or manager/assistant or chef/sek (de) capabilities. E.g. Erik Doe can add one ore more other Team (phone system) user as delegates so that Erik Doe does not need to deal with all calls himself.

Configure group call pickup as an user

Users can configure this on the Teams settings \ call settings page.

Configure group call pickup as an admin

In the Teams Admin Center you can configure group call pickup per user. You can add/remove users to a users group call pickup, you can set the notification mode (mute, ring, banner) and you can configure the order and when group call pickup to listed users in a users group kicks in.

Configure call delegation (boss/admin, manager/assistant, chef/sek) as an user

Users can configure this on the Teams settings \ general \ delegation settings page.

Configure call delegation (boss/admin, manager/assistant, chef/sek) as an admin

Also in the Teams Admin Center you can configure call delegation per user. You can add/remove delegates, you can define what permissions a delegate gets and if a delegate can change this setting (or need to call you to change it via Teams Admin Center).

Conclusion, opinion and summary

Compare to Skype for Business (Server) this is a very nice administration capability because it’s easy to access and manage. In the past with Skype for Business (Server) you had to use Sefautil, related Sefautil tools or even third party software for an more comfortable way of administrate user call settings. It’s very helpful from time to time to have a ability as admin to change these two settings for an user which might be unable to do this.

Managing Teams Call delegation and group call pickup via the Teams Admin Center works like a charm in my opinion.

Additional Resources

• Share a phone line with a delegate
• Call forwarding, call groups, and simultaneous ring in Teams

I stumbled upon a new feature which is under development for Microsoft Teams. Belief it or not but on the official Microsoft 365 (M365) roadmap “Microsoft Teams: Busy on Busy” (short, abbr. BoB) appeared in the list. It’s planned for May 2019.

What’s “Busy on Busy”?

Well, this feature gives a caller a busy ton or sound in case the callee is busy with another call/meeting. So, you as a caller then now “Ah, well the person I’m calling is busy, right now. I’ll try it later, send an IM or mail …”

Do you need this?

It depends. It’s a frequently and common feature in Germany. Most people are used to it. In US and other countries it is not so widely used as far as I’m aware of. There is a little different “telephony mindset”, e.g. “If I cannot get a call because I’m busy the caller can leave a voicemail… or it is forwarded to my delegates/assistant …” or “The caller can try another communication option…” That’s why it depends if you need it or not. In general to have it is a good idea so you can decide if you enable it for all or a few users (depending on how the feature can be configured after it’s development).

Update May 16, 2019 – Enable BoB

You can now enable/disable BoB via Calling Policies within the Teams Admin Center\VoiP\Calling Policies or via PowerShell. For details, please see the linkt below “Microsoft Teams Calling Policies (PowerShell Cmdlet Reference)”.

Either within the global or an user policy.

Conclusion, opinion and summary

I remember, in the past, that the announcement of Busy-on-Busy for Skype for Business Server was a big deal. Many customers in Germany were waiting for this nativ feature for SFB. It was released as part of a SFB Server 2015 cumulative update. The busy-on-busy implementation was not 100% as some customers expected it to be. Compared to their known and legacy busy-on-buy feature by their legacy PBX. However it was adopted partially. And third party app and tools for this previously SFB Server 2015 feature gap vanished. Finally, I’m sure Microsoft Teams Busy on Busy will be adopted by some Team users instead of or even supplementary to voicemail, call forwarding or else depending on the configuration and assignment options for BoB.

Please note that this post and its contents might be subject to change. Especially, because it was added and last modified on April 1, 2019.

Additional Resources

• Microsoft 365 Roadmap – Microsoft Teams:Busy on Busy (Feature ID 49990)
• Microsoft Teams Calling Policies (PowerShell Cmdlet Reference)