Information Technology Services’ Telecommunications department is pleased to share news about changes to the University of Toronto’s corporate cellphone service provided by Rogers Inc., our primary wireless vendor under the Ontario Provincial Vendor of Record program. 

The new cellphone contract (VOR 2.0) will provide a range of benefits, including: 

• Lower-cost monthly plans 
• New international roaming rates 
• Device lifecycle management program (Trade-in) 
• Option to purchase certified pre-owned (CPO) phones 
• New device finance and lease program 

Please note that any new user purchasing hardware with a two -year plan before the new contract is signed will remain under the old pricing until the term is completed. 

The launch date of the new VOR 2.0 pricing will be announced soon.

We recommend that if you wish to add a user under the new pricing, consider placing them on a month-to-month plan without hardware, and then transition them to the new VOR 2.0 plan once it becomes available. Alternatively, you may choose to wait until the new monthly plans are officially launched. 

For more information, please contact VoIP support voipsupport@utoronto.ca or Steven Wall steven.wall@utoronto.ca.

We will be hosting Information Sessions to discuss these changes in detail in the upcoming weeks.

The Communicator 7 application for VoIP is no longer supported by our current provider, GoCo, and will reach end of life on April 30, 2023. More than 2,000 staff and faculty who use Communicator 7 will be migrated to Microsoft Teams Phone by April 30.

In November 2022, the Telecom team announced that Teams Phone will replace Communicator 7 as the University of Toronto’s VoIP solution for making and receiving calls. Testing is underway to ensure a seamless transition between VoIP solutions.

For more information about the migration to Teams Phone, refer to the FAQs.

Questions? Please contact voipsupport@utoronto.ca.

Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions’ Telecom team within Information Technology Services is rolling out Microsoft Teams Phone, which will replace Communicator 7 as the University of Toronto’s VoIP solution for making and receiving phone calls.

Migration to Teams Phone will happen over the next 18 months, beginning with Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions staff in November 2022, followed by all units within ITS and other divisions and departments at the St. George and Mississauga campuses in a phased rollout.

“Being able to use MS Teams for making and receiving telephone calls will greatly simplify the user experience, reduce support calls and extend the functionality of an existing software application that many staff and faculty are now very familiar with,” says Patrick Hopewell, Director, Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions.

Teams Phone was piloted from June to December 2021 with successful results. In addition to eliminating the need to use a separate tool for VoIP, the move to Teams Phone will create cost savings.

“The monthly cost of a VoIP line will be reduced and will result in roughly $500,000 in savings annually for the University,” Patrick says.

While all Teams users can currently place calls to other Teams users, the Teams Phone feature will integrate individual VoIP lines into Teams and enable a dial pad feature, along with other popular VoIP features such as call forwarding, voicemail and much more.

Visit the Teams Phone resources page and review the Teams Phone migration FAQs for more information.

Published Nov. 8, 2022.

The 5G service is now available as an option on the Rogers Corporate Mobility Vendor of Record plan.

In order to get 5G service, you need a 5G compatible phone, the Rogers 5G plan, a Rogers 5G SIM card and to be in an area with 5G coverage.

The pricing for the 5G plan is the same as the Unlimited Data tier on the Vendor of Record plan, the only difference is you don’t have the lower tier with a 6GB limit. All users that choose the 5G option are automatically on unlimited data.

Please click here for some FAQ’s on 5G with Rogers.

If you have any other questions about 5G on the Rogers network or want to know how you can request 5G as a plan please reach out to Steven Wall at Telecommunications.

Bell Mobility have notified us that starting February 2022, U.S. carriers will begin phasing out their 3G / HSPA wireless network service in the U.S (including Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands). Here are the latest updates on the status of the 3G / HSPA networks of Bell’s roaming partners:

• AT&T has officially announced that their 3G / HSPA network will be discontinued in February 2022.
• T-Mobile has not made a public statement regarding their 3G / HSPA network, but we expect that it will be discontinued in 2022.

The discontinuation impacts Canadian wireless subscribers who travel in the U.S. and use devices that do not support 4G LTE data and Voice over LTE (VoLTE) roaming.

If your subscribers have devices that only support 3G / HSPA, they will not be able to use voice services (including 9-1-1), the Internet or mobile data in AT&T and T-Mobile coverage areas once these carriers’ 3G / HSPA network services are discontinued.

In addition, subscribers with 4G LTE devices that do not support VoLTE roaming will also not be able to use voice services in these areas.

To continue roaming in the United States, impacted subscribers will require a compatible 4G LTE device for data-only services or a VoLTE roaming compatible device for voice and data services.

 

BlackBerry has announced that effective January 4, 2022, all BlackBerry operating systems will go offline. This means any device/service running on these operating systems, will no longer function after this date. To view the full list of impacted devices visit bell.ca/blackberryOSdecomm.

Any BlackBerry devices currently running on an Android operating system will continue functioning normally however devices currently running on the BlackBerry operating system will no longer function.

 

t is important that you address this issue prior to the decommission date, as voice (including emergency calls to 9-1-1), text and data services will no longer function for your impacted subscribers after this date. In addition, you will continue to be billed for these subscribers after BlackBerry discontinues their support/services. 

If you have any questions please reach out to us at Telecom Services.

 

The University of Toronto is planning to migrate its corporate mobile services to the Rogers Network with Vendor of Record for the Ministry of Government Services offerings.

This will include an online ordering and administrative portal.

The solution will be at a minimum a replica of existing features and functionality with the intent to improve upon and create more efficient processes.

The first mobile users will be porting to Rogers in May 2021 with the remaining accounts to be ported to Rogers over the scope of 24 months as the existing individual contracts end.

We will be posting more updates to the website as the project proceeds, if you have any specific question please send your request to Steven Wall

 

Notice

The University’s VoIP provider which was previously named Broadconnect Canada has now been renamed as GoCo.

The name change took place in October 2020 so please be aware that invoices issued previously under Broadconnect Canada will now present the name GoCo.

 

 

All UofT users are being notified of a VoIP ‘Communicator 7 Upgrade’ application release that requires to be completed by February 18, 2021.

The VoIP/Telecommunications team are asking users to perform this update themselves if they have Administrator privileges. This new release does not apply to mobile phone VoIP users of the ‘Communicator 7’ app.

 

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For step by step procedures to update the application for both Window and MAC OS please refer to the following:

Instructions to update Communicator 7

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Release background: For the VoIP vendor [Broadconnect Canada/GoCo to maintain a high degree of software stability and network availability to the U of T customers, an update prompt has been enabled for the Communicator 7 desktop (Windows/MAC) application upon login or restarting of the application.

Impact: Users will be prompted to update the Communicator 7 Desktop application upon login or restarting the app. This will be an optional prompt over the course of three weeks post upgrade, but will become mandatory as of February 18, 2021.

The maintenance will be addressing two minor bugs:

-Wrong presence status set when choosing Automatic option

-Desktop client does not update user’s presence status based on Outlook settings

Current Version: 22.7.8

Upgraded Version: 22.7.16

 

Please note this change release update as you may be required to assist specific users within your respective areas and departments. The deadline date shared by our VoIP vendor to upgrade this desktop version of ‘C7’ application is prior to end of day Thursday February 18, 2021. The new version will become mandatory post this date.

 

Update for Mac: https://myphonetraining.com/files/Communicator_7.bc-uc.osx-22.7.16.36.dmg

Update for Windows: https://www.myphonetraining.com/files/Communicator_7.bc-uc.win-22.7.16.57.msi

 

Other downloads for Communicator 7 can be found here: http://www.myphonetraining.com/downloads/

If you have any support type questions, please email voipsupport@utoronto.ca

 

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