- Articles
- Microsoft Teams Trade-in Program gives cash f...
Table of Contents
It’s no secret that two big hardware companies, Avaya and Cisco, control approximately 50% of the business phone market worldwide. Chances are, if you’ve ever worked in an office in the past ten years, then you’ve likely taken calls from either a Cisco or Avaya phone on your desk.
But by mid-2020, all of that changed for most companies. No matter the size of the company and the number of offices, the global pandemic changed virtually every organization’s workflow around phone calls. Many of the on-premises public branch exchange (PBX) hardware powering those Avaya and Cisco desk phone systems in the office became obsolete overnight due to a forced move to remote work for every employee. Of course, it was not just the Avaya and Cisco on-prem systems that took a hit during that time. It was every company with any brand of on-prem PBX and desktop phones sitting unused in empty offices that had to ask: “what now?”
For those companies using Microsoft 365, the built-in Teams collaboration app became the cornerstone to enabling remote work. Between March-April 2020, usage of Microsoft Teams almost doubled from around 40 million to 75 million active users globally. At the time, Amaxra consultants were helping our small to midsize business (SMB) customers to leverage multiple options, including the “Business Voice” plan from Microsoft that replaced many on-prem PBXs with a full-featured and 100% cloud-based telephony system that seamlessly integrated with Microsoft Teams for all employees.
What happens to the old on-prem phone hardware after a cloud migration?
Whenever a SMB successfully migrates from an on-prem PBX to the cloud—especially for midsized businesses that often has offices filled with legacy desktop IP phones, conference room speakerphones, and video collaboration systems—the company must get rid of that old hardware. No responsible company wants to add to the local landfill, and the cost of either recycling or donating what was very expensive office equipment just a few years ago can be frustrating for most CFOs.
The good news is that there is a proven trade-in service for SMBs that either have moved or a planning to move their on-prem phone hardware into the cloud in favor of a Microsoft Teams telephony solution. Amaxra recommends the Microsoft Device Trade-in Program, which is a partnership between Microsoft and a vendor called “Network-Value.”
How the Microsoft Teams Trade-in Program works
By visiting the Network-Value website, you can find out how much the vendor will pay you for your legacy office phone hardware. They will take a surprisingly wide variety of not only IP phones from vendors such as Avaya, Cisco, and Poly, but also conference room speakerphones, video systems, and even wired (or wireless) headsets from names like HP, Lenovo, and Yealink, too. Smaller organizations can enter in a few devices by either searching by the name or model of your legacy devices. Larger SMBs with dedicated IT departments will find the Network-Value upload feature extremely useful, allowing the uploading of a list (a .CSV file or spreadsheet seems to work best) from the corporate IT asset tag inventory.
Once Network-Value has your list of eligible trade-ins and your fair-good-excellent estimation of the shape your hardware is in, the website provides you with an offer amount to buy your legacy hardware. Amaxra has found that hardware submissions that are less than three years old returns the best trade-in values on the site, but after five years (and depending on the condition of the hardware) the estimation often is just for Network-Value to recycle it for you.
If you receive a trade-in value for your legacy hardware, then Network-Value will actually cover the cost of the return shipping. For larger organizations, they will even provide on-site hardware decommissioning and packaging services, but there is a relatively steep cost for those services that are deducted from your total trade-in value. Once the trade-in hardware is received by Network-Value, they send you a check that you can use towards the purchase of new Microsoft Teams-certified hardware.
Amaxra can help optimize your new Microsoft Teams telephony solution
Even before the 2020 pandemic, Amaxra had already made the upgrade to cloud-based Teams telephony from our expensive on-prem legacy PBX hardware. We are a Gold-level Microsoft Partner with over a decade of expertise deploying Microsoft cloud-native productivity solutions with an emphasis on SMBs that value security and performance. No matter what your SMB needs to empower your hybrid workforce with secure collaboration, Amaxra consultants will help you find the best solution.