What is Zoom?
Zoom is a web-based video conferencing platform that you can use to host meetings or webinars online.
The University has set up a central Zoom account that all institutions can join. This reduces the overall admin burden of maintaining many licences and potentially lowers costs for individual institutions by consolidating the University's spend.
When could I use Zoom?
Microsoft Teams is the University's main collaboration tool and we encourage you to use this for most of your online meetings. You may decide, however, that Zoom is best suited for a specific meeting. For example, if you're hosting a virtual meeting or webinar with lots of external participants.
If you’re already using a paid Zoom account for some of your virtual meetings, you can now migrate your licence to the centrally-managed University Zoom account.
Benefits of using the University Zoom account
- Microsoft 365 integration means you can log in using your University account (formerly Raven).
- Your scheduled Zoom calls will appear in your Outlook and Teams calendars (this feature is not available to external institutions or Colleges that do not use the central University Microsoft 365 tenancy).
- You can hold hybrid Zoom meetings in the University’s Cisco Hybrid meeting rooms by using one of the pooled Conference Room Connector (CRC) licences.
- Licensing costs could be reduced for departments and institutions.
- You don’t have to administer your own Zoom subscription.
- Centralised cloud storage for recordings.
Who can use the University Zoom account?
If you are a member of staff from departments and institutions that already have a paid Zoom account, you can now migrate it to the University Zoom account. You will need an active CRSid to log in to the managed University Zoom account.
When your account is migrated, your pre-booked Zoom meeting IDs will remain valid, but your private meeting ID will change.
You can also request access to the University Zoom account if you do not have an existing Zoom account.
We can also register your deparment's domain with our Zoom account to prevent users creating their own Zoom contract. Contact us at phones@uis.cam.ac.uk to request this.
Shared accounts
Under section 1.2 of Zoom's terms of service, sharing of accounts is not permitted: "You may not share an account, Host rights, or any other user rights with any other individual, unless otherwise expressly pre-approved by Zoom in writing." Therefore, UIS will not support the creation of role-based or generic Zoom account IDs in the UIS Zoom service.
If you need to allow someone other than the meeting organiser to start a meeting or present in a meeting, Zoom has several options – see the user guide on roles in a meeting.
Meeting capacity
We are purchasing "Zoom One for Education" licences for Zoom, which allows you to host meetings of up to 30 hours with 500 participants.
Cloud recording storage
As part of the licence package, we are also providing Zoom cloud storage for recordings. Recordings will automatically be deleted after 120 days. If you wish to keep the recording beyond 120 days you will need to download and store the recording elsewhere.
Unauthenticated access to recordings has been disabled.
Delegated administration
We are not currently providing a delegated option for adding and removing users from the UIS Zoom account. All requests for changes should be made to phones@uis.cam.ac.uk.
Costs
Licences are annual, you will receive a pro-rata invoice shortly after the licence is issued, then annually at the beginning of December.
Licences cannot be cancelled or transferred between users midway through the year.
Renewals will take place in November each year. We will contact Departments in advance to confirm individual users’ licences to renew or cancel. Licences can not be cancelled or transferred at any other point during the year.
Zoom One for Education - Individual Annual Licence
- £33 per year plus VAT. The per-user cost will be reviewed annually to ensure that the fees charged cover UIS' costs. UIS is aiming to break even with the licence costs for Zoom. These licences are usually assigned in 2 to 3 working days. We will have access to additional features such as:
- Large Meeting 500
- Webinar 500
- Translation Captioning
- Whiteboard Plus
- Conference Room Connector
- Zoom Scheduler
- AI Companion
How to join the University’s Zoom account
If you have an existing Zoom account you want to migrate
If you already have a paid Zoom account, you can migrate your account to the University’s Zoom account.
- download the internal institutions Zoom migration request form (xlsx file, 180 KB)
- download the external institutions Zoom migration request form (xlsx file, 180 KB)
If you want a new Zoom account
Licences for new users can be requested by your local Telecoms Liaison Officers (TLOs) using the following order forms:
- download the external institutions Zoom licence order form (xlsx file, 180 KB)
- download the internal institutions Zoom licence order form (xlsx file, 180 KB)
TLOs must upload the completed forms using a Service Request Form on the Self Service Portal.
Once you have a licence, you can access the service at https://cam-ac-uk.zoom.us.
Get help and support
Please contact us at phones@uis.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions or if you need help.