SOLVED

Microsoft Teams unable to add 'contacts' to a 'contact group'

Copper Contributor

Hi there community.

 

I want to see if anybody else has experience with this because a MS Teams Support Tech just told me something that made my head spin.  

 

I'll preface the following by saying we have implemented a full Teams telephony environment with handsets and endpoint phone numbers (i.e. we are using Teams as our PABX).

 

Within Teams, under Calls you have PHONE and CONTACTS.  Historically (for every application Microsoft or otherwise) you would use CONTACTS like your address book and PHONE to... phone people (stick with me here!).  

 

I ran into a problem recently with our YeaLink phones as there has been a Microsoft update to the Teams software that has disabled the ability to manually enter a contact (for dialing) on the handset.  Yealink have confirmed this was changed by Microsoft and all contact dialing information is now managed through the Microsoft Teams environment on my computer (not the handset).  

 

The handsets can only see contacts in a Contact Group (not in Contacts.  Not sure why Microsoft designed it that way... but they have).  I have been told that you can't add CONTACTS to CONTACT GROUPS.  If you go to a Contact Group (under the PHONE tab) and go to the "Other Contacts" group (or any other group you have set up), and you add a contact, the contact that is returned is returned from Azure AD, not from CONTACTS.  This makes zero sense, but ok I'll go with it...

 

So I went into Azure AD, to a specific contact I wanted to add and I made sure I had a Mobile and Work Phone number stored in the User record.  Problem is when you add the user to the Contact Group... it doesn't pull through the phone numbers.

 

So - in a nutshell am I correct in my understanding that...

 

1.  Microsoft appears to have removed the ability to manually enter contacts via their MS Teams handset software (for phones like Poly, Yealkink etc.

 

2.  CONTACT GROUPS don't obtain the contacts from CONTACTS, they are pulled from AD

 

3.  CONTACT GROUPS don't pull the phone number details from AD when a contact is add

 

The net effect is that customers using Teams in it's full capacity as a telephony solution can no longer add contacts to Teams elephone for calling, so you either dial telephone numbers manually (really...) or the handset is only useful for receiving calls.  

 

The CS Technician was rather vague and told me MS Teams was only designed for calls between Teams Users (not entirely sure why I'm paying for the telephony option subscription... or why this is even offered as a product if that's the case).  Has anybody else experienced this issue?  We had a work around until recently when the handset software was updated.

 

What am I missing?  

2 Replies
best response confirmed by StaceeFrane (Microsoft)
Solution
Look up Their Name First. Several users could fix this error by simply searching for the problematic user's name in the Teams search window. So, before you try to add them to your group, look up their name first and click on their profile. Then, check if you can add them without getting the same error again.
Regards,
Rachel Gomez
Hi Rachel. This solution doesn't work (not sure why StaceeFrane has indicated it's the best response). I can look up this person in Contacts, but not in the Groups page. When you say "look up their name first" where are you looking this up?
1 best response

Accepted Solutions
best response confirmed by StaceeFrane (Microsoft)
Solution
Look up Their Name First. Several users could fix this error by simply searching for the problematic user's name in the Teams search window. So, before you try to add them to your group, look up their name first and click on their profile. Then, check if you can add them without getting the same error again.
Regards,
Rachel Gomez

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