Change the phone numbers on your Audio Conferencing bridge

When you buy Audio Conferencing licenses, Microsoft is hosting your audio conferencing bridge for your organization. The audio conferencing bridge gives out dial-in phone numbers from different locations so that meeting organizers and participants can use them to join Skype for Business or Microsoft Teams meetings using a phone.

In addition to the phone numbers already assigned to your conferencing bridge, you can get additional service numbers (toll and toll-free numbers used for audio conferencing) from other locations. You can assign these numbers to the conferencing bridge so you can expand coverage for your users.

Note

To assign/unassign a phone number for a conferencing bridge, the phone number must be a 'service' number. You can see the type of number it is by navigating to Voice > Phone numbers in the Microsoft Teams admin center and looking in the Number Type column. Microsoft 365 or Office 365 Communications Credits must be set up first in order for users to dial into the bridge on a toll-free number.

Steps when you're assigning a new service phone number to your conference bridge

Note

Except where it's called out otherwise, all these steps must be performed in the Microsoft Teams admin center.

Step 1 - Assign the new phone number to your audio conferencing bridge

  1. On the left navigation pane, go to Voice > Phone numbers.

  2. Select the phone number from the list, and select Edit.

  3. On the Edit page, under Assigned to, expand the dropdown and then select Conference bridge > Apply.

Step 2 - Change the default phone number of your conference bridge (optional)

The default phone number of your conference bridge determines the caller ID used when a participant or the organizer places an outbound call from within a meeting.

Only a service toll number can be set as the default number for your conferencing bridge; service toll-free numbers can't be set as the default number of your conferencing bridge. If you're assigning a service toll number and you would like to set it as the new default number for your audio conferencing bridge, perform these steps:

  1. On the left navigation pane, go to Meetings > Conference bridges.

  2. Highlight the service toll number that you want to configure as the default.

  3. Select Set as default.

Step 3 - Change the default phone numbers that are included in the meeting invites of users (optional)

Refer to Set the phone numbers included on invites in Microsoft Teams.

Note

You can also set phone numbers by adding them to the TeamsAudioconferencingpolicy and assigning the policy to your users. Toll and toll-free phone numbers added to the policy take precedence over the phone numbers set individually for users via the audio conferencing settings pane. If no phone numbers are added to the Teamsaudioconferencingpolicy, then the phone number set individually for users via the audio conferencing settings pane will be displayed in Microsoft Teams meeting requests. Audio Conferencing policy settings for toll and toll-free numbers has more information.

Step 4 - Update existing meeting invites of users using the Meeting Migration Service (optional)

For the next two steps, you need to start Windows PowerShell.

If you changed the default phone numbers included in meeting invites for some or all users, you can use the Meeting Migration Service to update already sent invites with the new numbers. For more information, see Setting up the Meeting Migration Service (MMS).

  • Run the Meeting Migration Service (MMS) for the users who had their default phone numbers changed in Step 2. To run MMS, use the following command:
    Start-CsExMeetingMigration user@contoso.com
  • You can also view the meeting migration status. All meetings would be rescheduled once there are no operations in Pending or In-Progress state.
    Get-CsMeetingMigrationStatus -SummaryOnly

Steps when you're unassigning a service phone number for a conferencing bridge

When you unassign a phone number from a conferencing bridge, users can't join any meetings using that phone number anymore. Because the phone number is changing, you should update all users with a changing phone number as their default. Update their meeting invites before the phone number is unassigned from the conferencing bridge.

If the phone number is removed without updating the users and their meetings, their existing meeting invites could contain a phone number that doesn't work for joining their meetings.

For the first three steps, you need to start Windows PowerShell. To see how to start Windows PowerShell, select Want to know how to manage with Windows PowerShell?

Step 1 - Update users who have the phone number to be unassigned as one of their default numbers

Replace the default toll or toll-free number for all users who have the number to be unassigned as a default number and start the process of rescheduling their meetings. To the toll or toll-free number, run the following command:

Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber -FromNumber <Number to be removed> -ToNumber <Number to be set as new default> -NumberType <"Toll" or "Toll-Free"> -RescheduleMeetings

Important

You can also change the default toll or toll-free number of users in the Microsoft Teams admin center. However, this won't automatically reschedule their meetings.

For more information, see Set the phone numbers included on invites in Microsoft Teams or Set the phone numbers included on invites in Skype for Business Online.

Note

Depending on the size of your organization, this could take some time to complete.

Step 2 - View meeting migration status using Windows PowerShell

All meetings are rescheduled once there are no operations in Pending or In-Progress state.

Get-CsMeetingMigrationStatus -SummaryOnly

For more information about the Meeting Migration Service, see Setting up the Meeting Migration Service (MMS).

Step 3 - Unassign the old phone number from the audio conferencing bridge

Use the Unregister-CsOnlineDialInConferencingServiceNumber cmdlet to unregister a Toll or Toll free number from a conference bridge.

Unregister-CsOnlineDialInConferencingServiceNumber -identity "toll number to be removed" -bridgeId "Conference Bridge ID"
Unregister-CsOnlineDialInConferencingServiceNumber -identity "toll free number to be removed" -bridgeId "Conference Bridge ID"

Note: To find the Conference Bridge ID, run the following PowerShell: Get-CsOnlineDialInConferencingBridge.

Important

After a phone number is unassigned from an audio conferencing bridge, the phone number will no longer be available for users to join new or existing meetings.

Save time and automate

To save time by automating this process, you can use the Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUser or the Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber cmdlets.

  • Use the Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUser cmdlet to change the default toll or toll-free number for specific users.

    • To change the default toll-free number for a user, run:
    Set-CsOnlineDialinConferencingUser -Identity amos.marble@Contoso.com -TollFreeServiceNumber   80045551234
    
  • Use the Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber cmdlet to change the default toll or toll-free number of users based on their original default number or their location.

    Note

    To find the BridgeID, use the Get-CsOnlineDialInConferencingBridge.

    • To set the default toll-free number for all users without one to 8005551234, run:
    Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber -FromNumber $null -ToNumber 8005551234 -NumberType TollFree -BridgeId <Bridge Id>
    
    • To change the default toll-free number of all users that have 8005551234 as their default toll-free number to 8005551239 and automatically reschedule their meetings, run:
    Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber -FromNumber 8005551234 -ToNumber 8005551239 NumberType TollFree -BridgeId <Bridge Id> -RescheduleMeetings
    
    • To set the default toll-free number of all users located in the U.S. to 8005551234 and automatically reschedule their meetings, run:
    Set-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUserDefaultNumber -Country US -ToNumber 8005551234 -NumberType TollFree -BridgeId <Bridge Id> -RescheduleMeetings
    

    Note

    The location that is used above needs to match the contact information of user(s) that is set in the Microsoft 365 admin center.

Troubleshooting

The Unassign button isn't available

You want to unassign a number, but the button isn't available. When you hover the number, you're redirected to contact Support with the following message: "Default or shared numbers can't be unassigned from the bridge. To unassign dedicated toll numbers contact support."

To obtain more information about the bridges, run the following PowerShell:

Get-CsOnlineDialInConferencingBridge -Name "Conference Bridge"

The result, aside other information like Identity, Name and Region, should also contain the DefaultServiceNumber.

Example, to unassign, the DefaultServiceNumber "8005551234"

Unregister-CsOnlineDialInConferencingServiceNumber -BridgeName "Conference Bridge" -RemoveDefaultServiceNumber 8005551234

About Windows PowerShell

With Windows PowerShell, you can manage users and what they are or aren't allowed to do. Windows PowerShell can help you manage Microsoft 365 or Office 365 and Skype for Business Online using a single point of administration. Having single point of administration can simplify your daily work, especially when you have multiple tasks to do. To get started with Windows PowerShell, see these topics:

Windows PowerShell has many advantages in speed, simplicity, and productivity over only using the Microsoft 365 admin center such as when you're making setting changes for many users at one time. Learn about these advantages in the following topics:

Change the settings for an Audio Conferencing bridge.