When anticipating the costs of the Dynamics 365 Contact Center, we also need to factor in the Azure consumption costs required. As we hopefully know by now – Azure Communications Service is a key service used to provide native voice and sms capabilities to the Dynamics 365 Contact Center.
Companies could leverage existing carriers and SBCs via direct routing, allowing them to retain their numbers and existing contracts. However, some companies may choose to port/bring their numbers to be hosted by Microsoft or would have a new number provided by Microsoft aka Microsoft as a carrier. In our example detailed in part 1 of this series, the company would like to leverage Microsoft as a carrier.
Evaluating what Azure components would be required when utilising Microsoft as a carrier would depend on the agreed carrier and approach. In our solution, we will use Microsoft as both our carrier and SBC. Therefore:
- PSTN costs should be factored which in the calculation. This would be based on the total estimated time that an agent, supervisor or a bot will be on a call and engaged with an agent. PSTN costs will differ per country and number type. For the latest PSTN pricing, refer to Microsoft Learn.
- VOIP costs also need be factored for the estimated time that a customer and bot will be engaged on a call with a customer. This should include outbound calls. Based on the volumetrics provided in the previous blog:
- 15,000 (inbound calls per month) * 10 mins ( call duration) = 150,000
- 8000 (outbound calls per month) * 10 mins = ( call duration) = 80,000
- 230,000 mins of VOIP costs should be factored for Year 1 for agent conversations.
- Additional VOIP costs will need to be factored for supervisors or other agents or users consulting or receiving hand overs during the conversation.
- If we assume that supervisors listen in or evaluate 10% of calls, we also need to add this applicable additional time for supervisors or other users to listen in or consult.
- Therefore the total time to be factored in for VOIP is 230,000 + 23,000 = 253,000.
- Azure Event Grid is used as the mechanism to trigger call recording. The usage of Azure Event Grid for call recording costs should be considered based on the total estimated call duration per month. This would also be 230,000 as calculated previously.
The consumption costs detailed above relate only to voice. There are different factors that would need to be considered for SMS or WhatsApp conversations.
To recap, when calculating Azure consumption for the Dynamics Contact Center: PSTN or Telephony charges should be factored in as well as VOIP and Event Grid/Call Recording costs.
I encourage everyone to review and familiarise themselves with the setup and licensing and consumption costs required for the different architectural designs that are available for the Dynamics Contact Center.
In my next post, we’ll review the licensing required for a contact center that chooses NOT to use Dynamics Customer Service as their CRM solution and also chooses to use a third party carrier via Direct Routing.
Thanks for reading!
Everything D365 