Voice Service Migration Procedures for Service Managers

Before submitting any information for the Zoom Phone migration using the migration app, here are some things to consider:

• Zoom requires a 1:1 relationship between users and extensions. In other words, each person can only be assigned to one extension. Typically, this will be their primary extension where they receive calls regularly. 

• Be sure that you identify any “shared lines.” These are lines that are not a primary extension on a phone, but can appear on one or more phones to ring or not appear on any phone at all and just route calls to another extension(s). You would see them listed as “Soft Extension-DID” on your monthly invoice. The soft extension and any extensions that are associated with the soft extension would need to be migrated to Zoom at the same time. 

• Identify any extensions that are common area phones (conference room phones, emergency phones, etc). These will require physical phones, which will not be supported until the 10/25/23 phase.

• Identify extensions that are associated with a contact center. These extensions will be migrated when we begin the contact center solution at a later date. 

• Identify extensions that are data restricted and require a physical phone. In this case, NI&S will need to change the Ethernet port configuration to allow the Poly phones to register to the Zoom cloud. Since digital service will no longer be supported once the migration to Zoom Phone is complete, you’ll need to identify digital phones and decide if they should be changed to VoIP (Zoom Phone) service with a physical phone or analog phone service. If they are emergency phones, they should be changed to Analog service. To request a conversion from digital to analog, please submit an ICR.

What to do prior to the signup deadline for the phase you choose:

Use the voice service migration application to confirm or correct the mapping of users to extensions and schedule the migration of services for individuals in your organization. You will need to complete this task before close of business on the signup deadline date for users that would like to be migrated during the session you choose. The migration application will provide you with a list of services for Orgs that have you listed as a service manager.

For each service you will need to:

1. Specify the assignment type:
   1. User
      The most common voice service type, associating a VT User ID with an extension. (see the note regarding service users below)
   2. Vacant Position
      During the migration, organizations may choose to continue providing service for an extension that will be assigned to a new user in the near future.
   3. Common Area Phone
      Common area phones are unassigned desk phones that can be used by anyone.
   4. Shared Line Group
      A shared line group allows Zoom Phone admins to share a phone number and extension with a group of phone users or common area phones. All members of the shared line group have access to the group's direct phone number and voicemail.
   5. Line Appearance
      A Shared Line Appearance provides an easy way for phone users to assign others to handle calls on their behalf. For example, an executive can assign calling privileges to their assistant, allowing the assistant to make and receive calls on the executive’s behalf.
   6. Call Queue
      Call queues allow account owners and admins to route incoming calls to a group of users. For example, you can route calls to your office's billing, sales, or customer service departments.
   7. Auto Receptionist
      Auto receptionists answer calls with a personalized recording and routes calls to a phone user, call queue, common area phone, or voicemail.
   8. Data Restricted
      Temporary designation for voice-only network connections. These services will become Common Area (see above) on 6/30/2024. There is no need to select this service type unless instructed by NI&S Customer Service.
2. Identify users who are fully remote workers as defined by the HR standards
3. Identify services that require international calling privileges
4. Specify the migration phase

Service Users

The Zoom Phone service utilizes the Virginia Tech Login service for single sign-on (SSO). This will provide users with a familiar and intuitive authentication interaction, but it does require some changes to the way that service users have traditionally been managed in the NI&S customer portal. Going forward, we need to maintain a one-to-one mapping between a person (identified by their Virginia Tech preferred email address) and a Zoom Phone extension. Voice services not associated with a specific person such as common area phones in a lobby, lab, classroom, conference space, or services utilized to connect analog devices such as fax machines and elevator phones should not be assigned a service user. By convention, you and the other service managers in your organization will be the designated points of contact for all common area and analog phones in your organization. 

How to purchase phones if needed:

Supported phones will need to be ordered through an authorized reseller. More information can be found here. 

How to provision phones:

The phone can be assigned to the user and/or extension in the NI&S customer portal. Instructions for this can be found here. Note that it will take around four minutes for phones to boot up, and they should not be plugged in until the phone number and physical phone MAC address are provisioned in Zoom Phone. Click here for procedures on assigning a MAC address to the zoom phone system in the NI&S Portal.