Once you have trialled and configured PSTN Conferencing with a few users you may roll it out much wider. This blog post contains the steps to do that using PowerShell so you can licence and enable your users for Skype for Business Online PSTN Conferencing very quickly.

Generate a User List

Create in Excel a list of users to licence by email address. Name the head of the first column “SIPAddress” (without quotes). Currently you cannot set a PIN during the enablement process, a PIN is set randomly and returned to you when the user is configured. If later this functionality arrives then add a second column called PIN and use the following formula in the next row to create a random four character PIN: =TEXT(INT(RAND()*9999),”0000″)

If you want a longer PIN change 9999 to the correct length and also 0000.

Finally, if the user is not licenced for anything in Office 365 already add their country code as the last column and name the column UsageLocation.

Save the file as a CSV file. It will look like this:

SIPAddress,PIN,UsageLocation
Andy.Jones@domain.co.uk,0503,GB
Bob.Smith@domain.co.uk,6064,GB

Licence The Users In Bulk

Connect to Azure Active Directory with PowerShell. Once connected you need to get your licence details, which are unique to your tenant. To do this run:

Get-MsolAccountSku | Format-Table AccountSkuId, SkuPartNumber

The first column in this returned list is referenced in the command to set the licence as [tenantname:AccountSkuId].

Locate the line that contains MCOMEETADV. It will read tenantname:MCOMEETADV and then MCOMEETADV. Before running the import of the CSV file containing all your users to licence, ensure you replace [tenantname:AccountSkuId] with the correct value for your tenant. Your value will be [tenantname:MCOMEETADV] with of course your tenant name instead of tenantname.

Import your CSV file to a variable in PowerShell using the following with the correct path instead of the suggestion I make:

$PSTNUsersToLicence = Import-CSV “C:\PSTN Conferencing\UsersForPSTNConf.csv”

Then run the following block of code. It will read the CSV file and licence each user for PSTN Conferencing. Ensure you have enough available licences on your tenant before you run this cmdlet block:

ForEach ($PSTNUserToLicence In $PSTNUsersToLicence) {
    Set-MsolUser -UserPrincipalName $PSTNUserToLicence.SIPAddress -UsageLocation $PSTNUserToLicence.UsageLocation
    Set-MsolUserLicense -UserPrincipalName $PSTNUserToLicence.SIPAddress –AddLicenses [tenantname:MCOMEETADV]
}

Enable PSTN Conferencing For Users In Bulk

Once the users are licenced you can go and assign the Microsoft conference bridge to them. You need to use remote PowerShell for Skype for Business Online for this.

If this is the first time you have set up Skype for Business then select your default number on the Microsoft Bridge page of the Skype for Business dial in conferencing admin portal. Ensure your PIN length is correct and your requirements set on Microsoft bridge settings page.

Then run the following if the users are assigned a third-party conferencing provider:

ForEach ($PSTNUserToLicence In $PSTNUsersToLicence) {
    Enable-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUser -Identity $PSTNUserToLicence.SIPAddress -ReplaceProvider
}

If the users do not have a conferencing provider already then it will licence them correctly even though you have used –ReplaceProvider. If they have a provider already it will fail if you dont include ReplaceProvider, therefore always include this value.

With the above cmdlet, the user will get assigned the default conference number in your default country. If they are located in different countries then add the ConferenceNumber column to the CSV file and provide the correct conference number from the Microsoft Bridge page in the portal. To assign the number in the CSV to the user add -ServiceNumber $PSTNUserToLicence.ConferenceNumber to the end of the Enable-CsOnlineDialInConferencingUser cmdlet.

Each users settings and PIN will be returned to the screen for you – save these if you want to. Each user will get an email with their conference provider and PIN automatically.