Understanding Auto Attendants in Microsoft Teams: Why Resource Accounts Matter
Auto attendants are a core feature of Microsoft Teams Phone. They give organizations the ability to automate call handling with greetings, menu options, and routing rules—replacing the need for a receptionist and ensuring callers always reach the right destination.
But before you can create a functional auto attendant in the Microsoft Teams admin center, there’s one key requirement: it must be tied to a resource account. Let’s break this down.
What Is an Auto Attendant?
An auto attendant is essentially an automated phone system that can:
- Play greetings for callers.
- Provide menu navigation (“Press 1 for Sales, Press 2 for Support”).
- Route calls to call queues, individual users, or voicemail.
- Operate 24/7 or follow business hours with different routing after hours.
Think of it as the front desk for your organization’s phone system inside Microsoft Teams.
The Role of Resource Accounts
A resource account is a special type of account in Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD). Unlike a user account, it:
- Doesn’t belong to a person.
- Exists to represent a service (auto attendants and call queues).
- Can be assigned a phone number through Calling Plans, Operator Connect, or Direct Routing.
👉 Without a resource account, your auto attendant won’t have an “identity” or a phone number to connect callers.
Common Misconceptions
It’s easy to confuse what’s required when creating an auto attendant. Here are a few things admins often mix up:
- Conferencing bridge: Used for Teams meetings so participants can dial in. Not related to auto attendants.
- Shared mailbox: Useful in Exchange Online for shared email, but irrelevant for Teams telephony.
- Calling Plan: This provides the phone number, but the number must be tied to a resource account before the auto attendant can use it.
The correct object you always need is the resource account.
Step-by-Step Process
Here’s how you typically build an auto attendant with a resource account:
- Create a resource account
- In the Microsoft Teams admin center, go to Voice > Resource accounts.
- Add a new account, give it a descriptive name, and set it as a “resource account.”
- Assign a phone number
- Attach a number from your Calling Plan, Operator Connect partner, or Direct Routing setup.
- This makes the resource account callable from the outside world.
- Build your auto attendant
- Navigate to Voice > Auto attendants and create a new auto attendant.
- Add greetings, call routing options, business hours, and holiday rules.
- Link the resource account
- Assign the resource account you created to the auto attendant.
- This ensures that when someone dials the phone number tied to the resource account, the call flows through the auto attendant.
Real-World Example
Imagine your company’s main number is +1 555-123-4567. You want callers to hear a greeting and then choose between Sales and Support.
- You create a resource account named MainLine-AA.
- You assign +1 555-123-4567 to that resource account.
- You build an auto attendant with a greeting: “Welcome to Contoso. For Sales, press 1. For Support, press 2.”
- You link MainLine-AA to the auto attendant.
Now, whenever someone dials the main line, the auto attendant takes over.
Key Takeaway
If you remember nothing else, remember this:
Every auto attendant in Teams requires a resource account.
The resource account acts as the bridge between a phone number and the auto attendant’s logic. Without it, callers can’t reach your system.
