Telephony project - moving to the new telephony system on Wednesday 15 May 

Email sent Wednesday 1 May to EFM staff who have a desk phone

Dear colleague,

As you may be aware, the University is in the process of transitioning to a new telephony system. This transfer is taking place in phases, and your department will transition to the new system on Wednesday 15th May 2024.

Significant preparatory work has taken place with your department’s Telephone Liaison Officer (TLO) to make this as simple as possible. To help with this, we are providing you with guidance on how to use the new system in advance, so you can familiarise yourself before the changeover.

New Telephony system

The bulk of the changes are taking place behind the scenes, so you won’t notice many differences. Your phone number will remain the same. Where static phones are needed - such as receptions and labs - you will notice new handsets.

The main change you will notice is the change to softphone as standard - known as Avaya Cloud Office. This means you will no longer have a physical handset on your desk - instead you will access your University phone number via an extension within your Chrome browser or through a web application. This reflects the big changes we’ve seen, with staff using Google Meet and working off-campus, away from their desk phones a significant proportion of the time.

It means you can easily access your University phone number straight from your computer, whether you are working on campus or elsewhere. It also means you don’t need to divert calls to a mobile phone, or wait until you are back at your desk to pick up any messages. Unlike previous softphone systems, this new system doesn’t require VPN, so it’s much simpler to use.

The new telephony system works best with a headset connected to your computer. If you have not been provided with a headset before, you should complete this Google Form.

We have prepared guidance on how to set up and how to use the new softphone system. Theresa Williamson and Ian McDowall have received training and can help you set up and use the new system.

New static phones

If you need to use one of the new static phone handsets - such as in a reception or a lab - we have prepared guidance on how to use the new handsets. Theresa Williamson and Ian McDowall have received training to set up and use the new handsets.

If you cannot use a softphone for accessibility reasons, follow the desk phone exceptions process.

Change over 

Your department will change over to the new telephony system on Wednesday 15th May 2024. Before then you can:

• Read the new user guidance

• Install and / or login into the new softphone system Avaya Cloud Office

• Change your voicemail access PIN from the default to ensure the security of your messages

If you set up the Avaya Cloud Office before your change over date, you may notice that a different temporary phone number has been applied to your account. This will be updated to your existing number on the change over date, when you will be able to use the system in full.

If you have any questions regarding the project please click on the link to complete a Telephony project general query form and we will respond as soon as possible.

More information about the project can be found on our Telephony project webpage