How do you integrate UCaaS with a CRM?

Microsoft's setup page for the Teams dialer in Dynamics 365 Sales shows the split, because it lists each piece as its own prerequisite. A seller needs a Teams license. The organization needs a phone system installed and configured, with a valid license to use it. There has to be a connection to the public phone network, which Microsoft says can come through a Teams calling plan, your own carrier or Direct Routing. The user needs an assigned phone number. The dialer is the connector, and it works only when the rest is already there.

Atlantech Online, for example, supplies the phone service for Teams through Operator Connect, at a published rate "as low as $3 per user/month" with number porting and support listed in the price. That covers the carrier's part. Microsoft's licenses are a separate requirement, and so is the Dynamics license.

The dialer works with Teams, and Teams reaches outside numbers through whichever carrier you chose. Microsoft's prerequisites accept any of the routes to the phone network. So you can pick the carrier on price, coverage and support, and the way calls reach the CRM stays the same.

The split also gives you a starting point when something fails. If a rep can't call an outside number from Teams itself, start with the phone license and the phone service before you look at the CRM. If Teams calls work and nothing appears in Dynamics, start with the connector's settings and the user's security role.

Connectors arrive with defaults, and the defaults make choices for you. The Teams dialer is a good example. With it switched on, incoming calls ring in Dynamics. Calls from colleagues ring only in Teams and aren't tracked in Dynamics. An option called "Document call attempts," which records unanswered calls in the activity history, is off.

That last default matters to anyone who manages by activity. Suppose a sales manager counts each rep's calls from the CRM. A rep makes forty calls in a day and reaches eight people. With the option off, the unanswered attempts aren't in the activity history, so the count falls well short of forty. Nothing is broken. The connector is doing what it was set to do.

So write the list before you open the settings page. It should say which calls create an activity, whether inbound calls ring in the CRM, and whether a missed call raises a notification. It should also say whether anyone's calls are recorded. In the Teams dialer, recording is optional, enabled per security role and configured through Microsoft's conversation intelligence settings. Missed-call notifications need in-app notifications allowed and one more read permission on the user's role.

In some pairings the CRM provides a framework and the phone vendor provides the app that plugs into it. In others, such as Teams and Dynamics, one company makes both. Each CRM handles this differently, so the first check is whether your two products have a supported pairing.

HubSpot lets you connect a calling app from its App Marketplace. Its help page for third-party calling lists that as available on all products and plans. HubSpot says what happens during and after a call varies by provider. One limit applies whichever provider you use: you can't place a call from a custom object record with a calling app. Where the app supports inbound calls in HubSpot, calls nobody answers are logged as missed calls. If no listed provider fits, HubSpot points developers to its calling SDK.

Salesforce has a date attached. Open CTI is the framework Salesforce has provided for third-party softphones. The Open CTI developer guide now says the framework is in maintenance mode and scheduled for retirement in February 2028. No new features are being added, and Salesforce directs new work to Salesforce Voice. If you're choosing a phone vendor for a Salesforce team, find out what its connector is built on and what the vendor plans to do before that date.

Dynamics 365 has a rule about exclusivity. When the Teams dialer is enabled for a user, other telephony systems connected through the Dynamics Channel Integration Framework stop working for that user. A team can't run the Teams dialer and a second phone system connected through that framework for the same people. The dialer also doesn't work on custom entities or in canvas apps. Microsoft marks call transfer and adding a participant as preview features, which it says aren't meant for production use.

A hosted phone service needs the same check. Atlantech's business phone service page says its hosted voice service integrates with CRM systems, helpdesk software and Microsoft Teams. What you need from any vendor is a supported connector for your exact CRM and edition. Put the CRM and its edition in the quote request, the same way you would list any other requirement when you evaluate UCaaS providers.

The Teams dialer lets you choose who gets it, and that makes a small first group easy. It can be enabled for all security roles or for specific ones. A user's role needs read access to Note and to Teams Dialer Admin settings. If you pick specific roles, Microsoft says they have to be associated with the root business unit, or users won't see the dialer in Sales Hub. After you save and publish, users refresh the page to see it.

Starting with three or four people has a practical reason. The calls they make can write to live customer records. If a default is wrong, you want to find out from thirty entries, before the whole team has written a month of them.

Suppose a 12-person sales team runs Dynamics 365 Sales and Teams Phone, with Atlantech as the carrier through Operator Connect. The admin turns the dialer on for one security role held by three reps and leaves the defaults alone. The reps then make five kinds of call, and someone reads the records afterward.

The first is an outbound call to a customer, placed from the contact's record and answered. The check is whether the call appears in that contact's activity history under the rep who made it. The second is an outbound call nobody answers. With the defaults it leaves nothing in the activity history, so the team decides whether to turn on "Document call attempts" and tries again. The third is an inbound call from a number stored on a contact, which should ring in Dynamics. The fourth is an inbound call from a number that isn't in the CRM at all. The fifth is a call between two reps, which by default rings only in Teams.

One more case needs a setup step. Put two test contacts on the same phone number and call from it. Write down which record receives the call. Write down what the fourth call, from the unknown number, was attached to as well.

Those written results are what the rest of the team gets trained on. When the records match the list you made earlier, add the remaining security roles. Keep these test calls as a routine and repeat them after any change to the dialer's settings.