Bandwidth is the underlying phone carrier that powers Microsoft Teams calling plan. When enabling the phone numbers with Clerk you are enabling SMS and going “wholesale” directly to the phone carrier resulting in added features and cost benefits. For more information refer to our carrier page on Bandwidth.
Microsoft's Operator Connect is a feature within Microsoft Teams that provides a seamless way for organizations to integrate with telephony operators. It simplifies the process of connecting Teams to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) by allowing organizations to use approved operators directly from within the Teams admin center. For more details refer to our Operator Connect page.
Operator Connect requires Teams Phone Standard or E5 license to work. For more details refer to our Microsoft Teams Licensing page.
By enabling your Microsoft Teams phone number with Clerk you are updating your phone number from Teams Phone Calling to Operator Connect. This is done by instantly enabling your phone numbers directly with the phone carrier that powers Microsoft Teams calling. This results in added benefits such as added functionality and reduced pricing.
Should you choose to move the number back to Microsoft, you will need to submit a port-in request to Microsoft from the Teams Admin Portal. You can expedite the port-in request by submitting a ticket with Microsoft Teams Voice team. For more details refer to the Microsoft documentation.
Should you ever choose to move the number to another carrier you can do so at anytime. Existing or new phone numbers acquired from Clerk belong to you as a customer.