We use Office 365 for business and office productivity, and we appreciate all the functionality because it has SharePoint and meets our requirements. I use OneNote and Visio, so we can order as we require it. The big advantage is that whatever features you want you can select, and whatever you don't want you don't select.
Office LTSC Professional Plus
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Access to advanced features boosts productivity despite pricing concerns in developing regions
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
The features of Office 365 that I find most impactful for improving productivity include OneDrive, so all our cloud data is there. Everything is backed up and always available, and if there is a maintenance issue, we receive good notice. It has everything one would need to run a modern office, providing every solution we require.
The collaboration tools in Office 365 enhance my team's workflow immeasurably, and they are absolutely top class.
What needs improvement?
In terms of disadvantages in Office 365, the cost is something some people complain about because I live in South Africa and it is quoted in dollars. By the time we exchange for our weak currency, it becomes quite expensive, but other than cost, there is nothing I would complain about. The product itself is absolutely superb, and while many companies in South Africa run Google because it is cheaper, cost remains a factor here. Microsoft does not give territorial pricing relative to exchange rates, unlike many other companies.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Office 365 for 5 years.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
The deployment of Office 365 was very easy.
I got one of my tech professionals to help with the Office 365 deployment, and he did not encounter any problems.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
For stability, I would rate Office 365 as a 10.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I think Office 365 is a scalable solution, and I would rate it a 9.
How are customer service and support?
For technical support, I would give them a rating of 10.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
It took a couple of minutes to set up Office 365, just registering, putting in the card details, and setting up the users, but it was very quick, about 30 minutes.
What about the implementation team?
I got one of my tech professionals to help with the Office 365 deployment, and he did not encounter any problems.
What was our ROI?
Regarding cost savings or return on investment after implementing Office 365, although there is an initial or monthly cost and we could do it annually, we choose to do it monthly. We find that the ROI is significant. We get the latest and greatest features, and today with Copilot and some of the really big advantages that they did not have a year ago, it has made a huge difference. We use Copilot in Excel quite extensively and not as much in Word because we are more of an analytics company. With ChatGPT, we are able to ask for solutions in Excel or PowerPoint, and the integration is great.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
In terms of extra expenses with Office 365, it depends on what you order. It is not Microsoft's fault; for example, I was in the UK and saw that paying $20 is no problem there, but paying that here equates to 400 of my currency, which makes the price steep sometimes. If I am paying for a Power BI Pro license at $20, costing me 400 Rand, that is a frontline tool, which is not expensive considering the work we produce. However, Office 365 can be on the pricy side if you start trying to access all of the functionalities.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I did look for some alternatives to Office 365 because some team members enjoy using Google Docs to assist their analytics work. But ultimately, we are very much a Microsoft shop.
What other advice do I have?
I need to do maintenance for Office 365 very seldom, once a year. In the maintenance process for Office 365, we have about 12 people involved.
For the maintenance side of Office 365, only one person is involved.
Looking at Office 365's pricing, I would give it a 4 on a scale from 1 to 10.
My overall rating for Office 365 is an 8 out of 10, but for the product itself, I would give it a 10.
I would definitely recommend Office 365 to other businesses, probably a 9 out of 10 for recommendation. This is only because of its price and the fact that they do not take into account developing countries such as South Africa, where they should give us more favorable prices or local prices.
We do not have a partnership with Microsoft, which is a sore point for us. We have reached out to Microsoft South Africa, and they are very hard to contact and largely uncooperative. We are a B-Level 2 and a B-Level 1, which are local affirmative action ratings that companies get. Level 1 is the highest, and Level 8 is the lowest. We hold amongst the highest BEE ratings, but we have not found Microsoft South Africa to be forthcoming or very open. We should have a partnership with them, and we run Power BI as we are a Power BI shop now.
I strongly would want to see a box within Office 365 for our team to have ChatGPT through OpenAI as well. We use Excel as a data source for many tasks and find that it integrates really well with Python. We write a lot of Python code and use Excel as a data sheet many times, and we operate through SQL and other zero elements as well. From an Office 365 viewpoint, we find that with Copilot and Python and Excel's provision for Python, it is very useful.
Experience vast integration and efficiency with streamlined tools
What is our primary use case?
Some use cases for Office 365 include using the Office applications such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, as well as OneDrive, Teams, OneNote, SharePoint, and Exchange Online. We have moved all our file server data to SharePoint and we've been quite successful at that.
What is most valuable?
What's valuable about Office 365 is that the file formats have become a standard, such as .doc files and .docx files for Word. In Excel, you can do a lot of data analysis and manage spreadsheets, which is especially useful for finance people. With PowerPoint, we can create very visual and easy presentations, and now with Copilot, it's even easier to generate a presentation format that you can adjust to your needs.
The integrations of Teams and SharePoint have impacted our project management positively because we work a lot with external clients who need access to information in our environment. Before, using file servers to give external access was cumbersome, and with SharePoint, creating a sharing link with an expiration date makes sharing information easier and more controlled. Also, SharePoint allows us to create websites for our intranet, while Teams enables groups to share information, chat, and create meetings, and we have even moved all our telephony system to Teams, which is working very well.
What needs improvement?
I'm suggesting that Microsoft could improve the product, particularly in managing Office 365, which is not cumbersome but requires knowledge of several different portals. You need to become an expert on each product to administer everything properly, as each portal has a different format that is not unified.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have several years of experience with Office 365, almost since it existed. I think it started approximately ten years ago or eight years ago, and in the company I'm working for, we've used it extensively. I've been with the company for nine years now.
How are customer service and support?
I would rate customer service and technical support with Microsoft a seven. The support from our partner SoftwareONE is very good as they get back to me quickly and escalate to Microsoft when needed. The issue arises when I need to ask Microsoft directly for support, and I have had delays, such as with a SharePoint issue that took two weeks to resolve, and another instance where the ticket was mishandled and sent to the wrong queue, which delayed the response even further.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Neutral
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
By the time I arrived at the company, everything was already Microsoft, and I have worked with Microsoft products for most of my professional life. I have experience with other products, but that was back in the '90s. I used Microsoft Mail, Lotus Notes, and Novell products back then, and I'm certified with Microsoft products since the '90s, meaning that about 80% or 85% of my experience is with Microsoft products in general.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup for Office 365 was quite straightforward because we already had Word, Excel, and PowerPoint installed, and it was just a matter of flicking a switch. However, setting up SharePoint required tweaking a lot of security because it's designed for sharing information, which can be quite open and not secure by itself. So I designed a whole security system around it, and Teams' most complicated task was the telephony setup, which we got help with from consulting.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing for Office 365 is not cheap, but it's also not terribly expensive. It depends on the size of the company, and I think it's competitive and appropriate. The advantage of Microsoft is the vast amount of products that integrate seamlessly, which offers better value than competitors such as Google.
What other advice do I have?
I would absolutely recommend Office 365 mainly for its standardization, as I believe the majority of companies around the world use Office. I don't have specific statistics about that, but I can see it from my experience when contacting other companies that they typically use similar products, with some exceptions using Google Suite. I rate Office 365 a nine out of ten.
Implementation enhances organizational security and collaboration through versatile feature set
What is our primary use case?
Our current use cases for Office 365 include using it as our email handler as well as for MDM, and we also have offline office which is very important for doing our regular work such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and all. We get help from the E5 plan and we are using MDM for more than 50 people in our team. This is because there was an incident where a data breach occurred in our organization. After that, we decided we should implement the MDM solution to protect personally owned devices. After implementing MDM, we are now secure enough to prevent leakage of our organization data.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature or capability of Office 365 that I found is the legal hold feature, which is excellent for customers to maintain regulatory compliance. Deleting data is a common occurrence; people can delete their data from their device, and it will be moved to the recycle bin for a certain period of time. After the email is deleted, we found that if legal hold is enabled for a particular user, Microsoft offers unlimited archival, meaning any email that comes to that email ID will be stored, and we can easily use the E-Discovery feature to check the emails, their history, and export them in a PST file, which is very beneficial for customers during audits.
Overall, Office 365 brings organization efficiency, as these tools are very helpful for every organization to maintain their records, organization data, compliance, and collaborations. Everything that is basically required by an organization is already taken care of in the Office 365 products.
What needs improvement?
The areas of Office 365 that need improvement include the organization sharing option in Teams, which we found to be limited. If the organization does not enable it, we cannot get the IM details in Teams. If Microsoft can make it more reliable similar to social media - for example, if I am dealing with customers and I already had a meeting with them in Teams previously, the customer account should be visible to me along with their current status, such as busy, away, or available.
It would be easier for us to communicate with our customers or colleagues because it works within the organization. I am specifically referring to cross-functional connectivity for other organizations that we work with.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Office 365 for almost two and a half years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability of this solution is very high, and I would rate it a full 10. I have been using it for the last three years and have not faced any issues during this time, leading to 100% uptime.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I would rate the scalability of this solution as nine out of ten.
How are customer service and support?
I rate the technical support for Office 365 at about four to five out of 10 maximum. The support center is in China, and making them understand our issue is a hectic challenge. Every time we log a ticket, a new agent comes, and we have to describe the problem again. It is common that when the shift changes, the new staff does not have the case history, and we have to start explaining again. Customers expect quick solutions rather than reading KB articles.
With tools such as ChatGPT allowing us to find the same KB within seconds, we question why we spend so much time waiting for responses from Microsoft support. I suggest improving regional support for India, making it easier for customers to connect. Additionally, when we log cases, the support should check known issues quickly and engage with us directly when addressing unknown issues rather than just sending us basic help articles.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup of Office 365 is easy. Though I don't have hands-on experience, I can share our thoughts. During implementation, it took very little time and was very easy. We did not face any issues. We found that email delivery, which was being held, got delivered after three or six hours. I would give it at least eight out of 10.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Regarding similar service providers available in the market, we used Zoho previously, and we found it to be a wonderful product. However, we are more comfortable with Microsoft's UI, which influenced our choice to move to Microsoft instead of using Zoho.
What other advice do I have?
The feature of Office 365 that has proven most beneficial for collaboration in my team is definitely Microsoft Teams. It is a commonly used platform throughout the organization, serving all our collaboration and instant messaging needs.
For the maintenance of Office 365, we only need one person.
Regarding pricing, I would give Office 365 an eight. It is pretty expensive.
The licensing is complicated because when we ask for pricing, the Microsoft team presents 10 to 15 different plans with almost the same features but different prices. It is difficult for customers to differentiate, especially since we are dealing with specific use cases. We need the application for specific purposes, and Microsoft has 20 options. Customers generally tend to choose the least costly option, resulting in missing out on crucial features and needing to upgrade through the pricing tiers again. If Microsoft can simplify the licensing, it would be easier for customers to opt for their services.
Overall, I rate Office 365 eight out of 10.
Office 365's collaborative tools improve team efficiency and enable seamless integration across productivity platforms.
What is our primary use case?
Office 365 is used primarily for document management, reporting, and cross-functional collaboration. While our current data volumes are manageable, we complement Office 365 with Power BI for reporting and Azure Data Factory for data processing tasks. These tools help us analyze trends across projects, resources, and operations.
Team collaboration is streamlined using Microsoft Teams and SharePoint. We co-author reports in Excel, integrate links through platforms like Jira, and share updates instantly. This real-time collaboration accelerates feedback loops and reduces delays in communication and delivery.
How has it helped my organization?
Office 365 has significantly enhanced collaboration and productivity through integrated tools like Teams, Excel, and Power BI. The cloud-based setup has also improved data accessibility and sharing efficiency across departments.
What is most valuable?
Seamless Cloud Integration: Eliminates the need for VM-based transformation environments, particularly when paired with Azure Data Factory.
Real-Time Collaboration: Teams and SharePoint enable efficient document sharing and co-authoring.
Power BI: Offers strong visualization and reporting capabilities.
Overall ROI: We’ve seen notable value in terms of productivity and operational efficiency.
What needs improvement?
A key enhancement would be integrating AI-based prompting directly within Microsoft Word or Office apps. The ability to generate structured content using AI prompts would save time and improve document creation workflows.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Office 365 for about one and a half years. Our organization recently migrated to it from an on-premises Microsoft setup.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The platform has been reliable. A rare instance of downtime was resolved by Microsoft support within a few hours.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Office 365 handles our current needs well. For larger datasets or transactional systems, integration with platforms like Azure Data Lake would be more suitable.
How are customer service and support?
Our experience with Microsoft support has been positive. Issues were addressed quickly and effectively.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We previously used on-premises Microsoft tools before migrating to Office 365 for a cloud-based experience.
How was the initial setup?
Our migration from on-premises to Office 365 was smooth and straightforward.
What about the implementation team?
Office 365 is managed internally by our organization under an enterprise licensing agreement.
What was our ROI?
Office 365 delivers strong value in terms of both cost and productivity gains.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Licensing and pricing are handled by our admin team, and the details are not directly visible to us.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Other options may have been considered, but I cannot recall the specific details.
What other advice do I have?
I would recommend Office 365 to other professionals for its comprehensive suite of tools, strong integration, and cost-effective cloud performance. I rate it 9 out of 10.
Collaboration tools and AI integration support workflow efficiency
What is our primary use case?
Having the Copilot implemented recently in Office 365, Microsoft has some edge on that.
What is most valuable?
Having the Copilot implemented recently in Office 365, Microsoft has some edge on that.
Teams and SharePoint are the best features for my team's collaboration in Office 365.
The Copilot integration in Office 365 stands out by providing various different kinds of support to daily users utilizing AI help on other products.
What needs improvement?
To make it even better in the next release, they can improve the categorization and utilize AI help to suggest mail descriptions and everything to categorize mail in different ways, depending on the priorities of a user, and so on.
They still need to improve their email categorization, and their AI capabilities have room for improvement.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have implemented Office 365, and it has been already a few months.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
We have not faced any issue with the integration of Office 365.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It is already implemented and being used.
What other advice do I have?
I am generally satisfied with my current solution.
I rate Office 365 eight out of ten.
I have another call and meeting in five minutes.
Improved data security and increased productivity enable focus on core tasks
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
What needs improvement?
For how long have I used the solution?
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
How are customer service and support?
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
What other advice do I have?
Integration and collaboration improve efficiency but interface and customization need enhancements
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
SharePoint, which is my bread and butter, integrates seamlessly with Teams to enhance project management. I started with building out SharePoint sites and having them connect with Teams to offer a user-friendly experience for those less comfortable with SharePoint. SharePoint serves as the backbone for Teams, storing all their content and capitalizing on workflow pieces; I enjoy working with Teams and SharePoint.
SharePoint acts as a glorified portal with extensive integration options not only between Office 365 apps but also third-party applications. For instance, building a Power App linked to a SharePoint list is quick and easy without needing a SQL database, resulting in tremendous cost savings as well.
What needs improvement?
On the SharePoint side, allowing more customization options would greatly enhance functionality; simpler out-of-the-box versions are fine for some scenarios, but customizing SharePoint can be super challenging with newer Office 365 versions compared to previous on-prem ones.
How are customer service and support?
The overall rating would be seven and a half.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
What was our ROI?
We are also shifting toward big data solutions and A.I.-generated everything, so I'm trying to redirect my focus beyond just being an Office 365 expert, considering how A.I. can improve Office 365.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
What other advice do I have?
I have not yet played with Microsoft Security Copilot or Copilot for security. I am currently dealing with Copilot as I'm working on a demo today to build my own chatbot. I want to showcase the ease of building it and discuss the associated pains and struggles while also demonstrating to the group why we should use Copilot and where we should go next.
This is just the Copilot Studio accessed via office.com under Power Apps; I did not go through GitHub. I deal a lot with Gemini and use ChatGPT frequently. I consider ChatGPT my extra voice of support for inquiries, but I trust but verify what it provides, as I have encountered incorrect information from it several times.
On a scale of one to ten, I rate Office 365 an eight out of ten.
Daily routines streamline with enhanced communication tools
What is our primary use case?
My most common use case involves starting my day with Office 365, specifically with Outlook and Microsoft Teams. Teams is very good, and I am trying to get used to the new user interface because it changed a bit, but I spend a lot of time in Teams and, of course, also in Outlook. I also use Microsoft Loop for structuring and organizing meetings that I have with my colleagues. It's a very handy way of keeping the information without being over-structured, and I use Loop because I prefer to note something down instead of just saying 'Oh, I will remember this' and not writing it anywhere. Rather than using a very complex, huge application that needs time to open and has a very big structure, Loop is something in between, and I find it a very useful tool that I also use on a daily basis. If I would have to pick three, they would be Outlook, Microsoft Teams, and Loop.
What is most valuable?
In terms of advanced features, those are things that we usually do with Power Platform. We try to avoid building super complex Excel templates when we can use another more suitable tool or build a Power App for that.
What I appreciate in the Office 365 world is having Copilot as an assistant that can help automate many things. For example, if you need to translate something and want to ensure the translation looks professional and has a specific tone—formal, informal, friendly—then you can use Copilot for that or get a first idea and then edit the result. It helps to summarize meetings in Microsoft Teams and points out the most important key aspects discussed in the meeting.
If you have people who were not able to join the meeting, you can copy the summary and the next steps and send it to them. I find the extension with Copilot very good. One of my favorites is Copilot in Microsoft Outlook, which helps you find a meeting with people who have very busy calendars. I have a lot of appointments, and it's difficult to find a free slot. When I need help finding a slot that works for three or four colleagues with busy calendars, Copilot in Outlook helps with that.
What needs improvement?
In terms of improvements in Office 365, there might be things that need to be improved in many tools. I have some improvement suggestions for Copilot, but not the actual product itself, because I grew up with these tools. I did not know it differently. I had to use Outlook, and I learned how to do it, and now it's the default for me.
Sometimes there are simple bugs. For example, I create an appointment, and it disappears or is differently showcased in Microsoft Teams because Teams also has a meeting section as opposed to Outlook, but these are just temporary bugs. In general, these tools are very synchronized with each other.
What I would to be able to do is copy-paste meetings. If I want to send several blockers or potential meetings to the customer, I create the first one, and I want to be able to paste this first blocker on another day as blocker two, just paste and change the title. That's difficult to do. This is not something which works with Outlook yet.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Office 365 for 7 years.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Regarding whether I consider Office 365 a cost-effective solution, I would say that if in the normal packaging, using AI—which will become the norm and the default in the near future—costs extra in Outlook, it would be nice to have those integrated in the licensing and not have to pay extra for Copilot or extra AI features. AI should be an intuitive thing and a daily job, and perhaps Microsoft should find a way to make the model still financially beneficial for them without raising the price just because we have new features and AI capabilities.
What other advice do I have?
The name of the company is Orbis SE now. It's just the company change; the rest remains the same. On a scale of one to ten, I rate Office 365 an eight out of ten.
Integration and cost effectiveness drive value and efficiency
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
What needs improvement?
For how long have I used the solution?
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
How are customer service and support?
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
What other advice do I have?
User-friendly interface and strong security enhance business collaboration
What is our primary use case?
Splunk is very popular and many enterprises are using Splunk, and even some of our customers are using Splunk. Splunk is also very good, but we only integrated with ServiceNow so we don't know the internals of ServiceNow and pros and cons of Splunk.
SolarWinds is also very powerful. I have integrated SolarWinds with the ServiceNow infrastructure.
I know what SolarWinds does, but I am not a dedicated infrastructure resource. I'm a pure ServiceNow consultant.
SolarWinds is a very powerful tool that can scan the client network or any network and get appropriate results on whether which server is down, which component is down, or which network component is not working. In the past, we integrated SolarWinds and whenever any network component went down, our integration created an incident in ServiceNow immediately.
SolarWinds is much more than a monitoring tool. They have database offerings also, but I know it as a monitoring tool and it was very powerful.
Device monitoring and server monitoring are what we work with. That's what I know about it.
What is most valuable?
Collaboration and Teams channels are the most powerful tools that help us organize our day-to-day activities and really help us improve our business and add business value.
Collaboration is the key to address any gap either in enterprise processes or technological innovation. Microsoft Teams helps us to effectively collaborate and communicate, which helps us achieve our objectives.
We can trust Microsoft for security. All our business documents are parked on the Office 365 cloud network. We can be secure and should not worry much about security because we trust Microsoft for the security of our data.
In the context of security of our data, the first point is collaboration and coordination to optimize our business, the second is security, and the third thing is that it's a wonderful user-friendly experience.
What needs improvement?
It is already a very matured product, but there is always scope for improvement. Effective use of all products can be improvised with the use of AI, machine learning, and deep learning.
Microsoft is in the AI arena, so products can be improved in the coming time, and we can expect that.
For how long have I used the solution?
I did that integration four or five years back and there have been already a lot of new features added. Currently, I can only talk about the older implementation.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rarely get any issues, but occasionally when issues occurred, they were resolved early by the Office 365 internal team. We never had to reach Microsoft, but I believe they have a very powerful support team, and I don't have any doubt or concern over that.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Right now, I cannot comment on scalability issues.
How are customer service and support?
The cost is justified because the product is wonderful.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Price may be a factor, but our organization is too big. I am not involved in any costing because my level is just senior architect. As our organization is big, we can afford it easily. For big organizations, cost is not an issue, but for smaller organizations or mid-size organizations, cost may be an issue. It may be costly.
What other advice do I have?
Office 365 is the main tool we are using for our day-to-day operations. Office 365 provides a very good experience.
We are using many tools and apps of Office 365, primarily Teams, Outlook, and SharePoint.
Microsoft is in the AI arena, so products can be improved in the coming time.
I rate this solution nine to nine and a half out of ten.