Free Microsoft Teams

Coronavirus has created a huge surge in remote working and the demand for collaborative working solutions. In particular, Microsoft Teams usage has increased significantly. In fact, on 31st March 2020, Microsoft recorded 2.7 billion total meeting minutes using Teams in a single day.

Teams is bringing simplified remote working services and practices to millions of new home workers, giving them the tools they need to continue to communicate, hold effective meetings, collaborate and share the content they need to achieve their goals. As a single, intuitive and robust interface, onboarding new workers to Teams is a quick and effective way to continue business operations with minimal disruption.

Microsoft is committed to making Teams available to everyone and help customers navigate remote working challenges. To support this effort, Microsoft offered a free Microsoft Teams trial available to everyone on 1st April 2020 with a 6-month Office 365 E1 trial offer.

However, on Monday 4th May 2020, this offer was discontinued. Instead, Microsoft is offering free Microsoft Teams for 6 months when customers purchase Office 365 E1 or Microsoft 365 Business Basic licenses on an annual subscription basis. Both options include access to the full Teams platform. Below is a summary and more details around the latest offer:

• For new Microsoft 365 customers with more than 300 users – Office 365 E1 licenses will be free for the first 6 months, on an annual commitment
• For new Microsoft 365 customers with fewer than 300 users – Microsoft 365 Business Basic will be free for the first 6 months, on an annual commitment
• For existing Office 365 Exchange Online Standalone customers – If you have Exchange only, there are similar offers available. Get in touch for more information and to speak directly to one of our Office 365 consultants.

How is this offer different from the Office 365 E1 Trial launched on 1st April 2020?

The updated Office 365 E1 and Microsoft 365 Business Basic license offers differ from the Office 365 E1 Trial in two ways:

1. These new license offers are only available to new customers with a new Microsoft 365 tenant subscription
2. Customers are required to commit to an annual monthly billed subscription when leveraging the Office 365 E1 or Microsoft 365 Business Basic offers.

How long is the promotion in place?

These promotions will be available for new customers to leverage until 30th June 2020.

What about customers who have already started the Office 365 E1 Trial?

You can continue to use existing trials and all features will remain enabled and supported by Microsoft for the period of trial. However, you will no longer be able to activate new instances of the Office 365 E1 trial.

How will new customers be categorised?

To qualify for the offer, you must not have a current paid or recently cancelled (within the last 30 days) subscription for any of the products below.

How many licenses can be acquired through the license offers?

• The Office 365 E1 promotion has a license limit of 3,000 licenses. Additional licenses are not eligible for the pricing promotion.
• The Microsoft 365 Business Basic promotion has a license limit of 300 licenses in line with seat restrictions for this license type.

For customers that do not fit into these license limitations and want to discuss their best licensing options, please get in touch.

What is included in the free 6 month trial period of the new license offers?

For each license assigned to a user in the trial, additional backend services are provisioned to enable the full value of Microsoft Teams. This includes:

Please get in touch to discuss any of the new Office 365 E1 or Microsoft 365 Business Basic license offers with one of our experienced Office 365 consultants.