Do I need an extra licence for a meeting room?

No. Room and equipment mailboxes in Exchange Online do not need a licence of their own. Only a Teams Rooms device in the room, such as a screen with a camera, requires a separate Teams Rooms licence.

How is this different from a shared calendar?

A shared calendar does not check whether a time slot is already taken, so anyone can book over it. A room mailbox decides for itself: it accepts when the room is free and declines a double booking.

Can staff book a pool car or projector too?

Yes. You use an equipment mailbox for that. It works the same way as a room mailbox: you add it to an appointment and it accepts or declines automatically.

Can a booking require approval first?

Yes. You can appoint a delegate who reviews requests for a room or piece of equipment first. That is useful for a boardroom or a pool car.

Can everyone see what my meeting is about?

Not by default. The room calendar shows the organiser’s name instead of the subject. That keeps confidential appointments, such as a job interview, confidential.

Double-booked meeting rooms: how an SME should book rooms and equipment in Microsoft 365

At ten o’clock, two groups are standing outside the same meeting room. Both had ‘booked’ it: one on the whiteboard, the other in a shared calendar. The pool car and the projector go the same way. Microsoft 365 has a simple answer to this that many SMEs never use: room and equipment mailboxes.

Why a shared calendar does not work

Many offices manage meeting rooms with a shared calendar, an Excel sheet or a note on the door. That works as long as nobody makes a mistake. A shared calendar does not check whether a time slot is already taken: anyone with write access can book over it. On top of that, a colleague cannot see in an invitation whether the room is really free, and bookings made by people who leave sometimes disappear without anyone noticing.

A room mailbox solves this. It is a special mailbox in Exchange Online with its own calendar, which decides for itself whether a booking fits.

Room mailboxes and equipment mailboxes

Exchange Online has two kinds of resource mailbox:

Room mailbox. For a meeting room, consultation room or hot desk. You can record its capacity and location, so staff can see how many people it holds.
Equipment mailbox. For anything shared that is not a room: a pool car, a projector, a guest laptop or a measuring instrument.

Resource mailboxes do not need a licence of their own, and nobody signs in to them directly. You manage them in the Exchange admin center or the Microsoft 365 admin center. If you want a Microsoft Teams Rooms screen in the room, that device does need its own Teams Rooms licence; for booking alone, it is not required.

Booking through Outlook and Teams

A member of staff schedules a meeting as usual and adds the room, through the location field or the room finder in Outlook. The room mailbox checks its calendar: if the room is free, it accepts; if it is taken, it declines and says why. Double bookings stop happening, even when two people book at the same moment.

With a room list, such as ‘Utrecht office’ or ‘First floor’, you group rooms together. In the room finder, staff can then see at a glance which rooms are free at the chosen time.

Booking rules worth setting

By default, a new room mailbox in Exchange Online accepts bookings automatically when the room is free. On top of that, set a few rules that suit your office:

Maximum duration. Stop anyone from holding the best room for a whole week.
How far ahead. Decide how many days ahead people may book, so recurring meetings do not claim the whole calendar for the year ahead.
Approval. For the boardroom or the pool car, you can appoint a delegate who approves requests first.
Who may book. If needed, limit a room or car to a specific group of staff.
Subject and privacy. By default, the room calendar shows the organiser’s name instead of the subject. Keep it that way if meetings can be confidential, such as a job interview or a performance review.

What to watch out for when you switch

Move existing bookings from the old shared calendar or list before you close it, and ask people to rebook recurring meetings with the room added. Give rooms a clear, recognisable name that includes the location, so nobody picks the wrong office by mistake. Record who may change or remove a room; that belongs in your IT documentation. And when someone leaves, check whether long-running bookings are still in their name, so a room does not look taken for months.

Already using a shared mailbox for a team calendar? That is still fine for people’s or teams’ calendars. For rooms and equipment, a resource mailbox is the better choice, because only that stops double bookings by itself.

How Floor ICT handles this

Floor ICT takes stock of which rooms, cars and equipment you share and how they are booked today. We create the room and equipment mailboxes, with capacity, location and room lists, and set up the booking rules and approvals you want. We then move existing bookings across and give staff a short guide on booking a room in Outlook and Teams. As part of our managed service, we adjust rooms and rules whenever your office changes.

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