BES + Exchange CAL complexity
 

Hi, recently i'm pulling my head and contacted Blackberry support they're not usre about license issues. And after searching in internet for 1 hour, I still can't find the answer. I hope anybody can help me with your experience with license problems.

We have BES 4.1 and 20 BES CALS. And we have Exchange 2003 with 50 CALS. Then we have 70 email users, 20 Blackberry users and 50 users with only Outlook. In thise case, should I purchase 20 other Exchange CALS or does BES CAL also cover Exchange CALS?

And let's say we have 50 Exchange CALs and 50 Blackberry CALS and 50 users all using outlook and blackberry. If I want to add one more user who needs Outlook and Blackberry, should I purchase Exchange CAL only and set up POP email on his Blackberry so that we don't need to purchase BES CAL? Because Exchange CAL costs $67 and BES costs $100. If Blackberry can have Exchange email without going through BES by setting up POP email, I don't see any point to purchase BES CAL.

Does anyone have experiences on solving this complicated client license issues with BES + Exchange?

Exchange CAL and BES CAL are unrelated. For BES CAL, you need a CAL for every BlackBerry you add to the BES. So if your BES has 50 BlackBerry then you should have 50 BES CAL.

dude above is correct, every BB users that is on your BES will need one CAL.

you mind breaking that down to what the question is.?
I sell CALS and BES servers so do have experiance.

Are you sure? Because I called Sprint/Nextel and they said, BES CAL also includes Exchange CAL. So I don't need to purchase Exchange CAL for every user usinb Blackberry with BES CAL.

Yes, we're sure. That doesn't even make logical sense. How would RIM's BlackBerry Enterprise Server, a standalone product that is not related to, endorsed by or supported by Microsoft, include client access licenses to Exchange? All BES does is use an Exchange mailbox and user that is set up during installation (BESAdmin usually) to intercept the mail and send it over to the BES for delivery to the BB and also does the reverse from the handheld [an oversimplification, but in essence that's how it works]. It isn't a part of Exchange or Exchange licensing. The user still has to be set up in Exchange and you can bet Microsoft is going to want their money for the user license. They don't care whether there's a BES involved or not.

On the other point, when you already have the server installed, the $100 is a small price to pay for all the features of the BES. Sure you can set up Exchange via BIS but the email will have a long 15-minute delay and there are is no wireless sync of PIM data (contacts, tasks, calendar, notes) or OTA backups. It makes is soooo much easier from a support standpoint to have the server automatically backup the handheld and the users don't even need to ever plug the BB into the desktop. The license fees are worth the seamless experience.

Thank you all you. I just called Sprint and checked with another tech. He said BES CAL used to include Exchange CAL, but not anymore. I asked why BES CAL is the same price as before and he said '.....'.
I have another question. We have 200 drivers using Blackberry for email and phone is disabled through BES. What they do is they receive jobs through Blackberry email(not our exchange email), email. So it doesn't have to be connected to our BES,but Sprint said to disable phone function, we have to hook up phones to BES and disable. So we're basically spending $100 for each phone just to disable phone function. And also to hook up to BES, I had to create exchange account which costs me another Exchange CAL. Does anyone have better idea for this environment? What drivers want is 'xxx@sprint.blakcberry.net' email which is set up through Blackberry deivcie, not our exchange email and phone funtion should be disabled. Should I purchase BES CAL to disable Phone and Exchange CAL to hook up the blackberry to exchange server?

Yeah, don't buy a phone plan! You should be able to get data only, no? I know other carriers do this but if Sprint doesn't, you can check with them to see if they can provision the phone in such a way that voice calls are not allowed. If none of that is possible, one solution *may* be removing the phone module from the BB manually. I've never done this but I'm sure someone has. You shouldn't need to do that though because I would think you can get a data only plan with Sprint and it would not have the ability to make calls.

I do have another idea though...if you have one CAL, you can activate each of the BB's (one at a time) to the BES and then send the IT policy that disables the phone and whatever else you want to restrict, and then remove the account from the BES. The IT policy will stay after the phone is removed from the BES. You could keep activating different BB's on the same account one at a time and do this. If you disable PIM sync and backup for this account, the enterprise activation will be much faster and it won't mess with importing contacts or backing up the settings/data on the devices.

Not buying a phone plan will not disable the phone. The phone will still work and the carrier will charge at premium rate for phone calls because you don't have any minutes in your phone plan. The only way to disable the phone is via IT policy.

Thank you. Sprint screwed me. They gave me 200 BES CAL free initially and want to charge $100 for additional blackberry.

Anyone reading this post, be careful with Sprint/Nextel how they try to sell BES CAL. It may screw you as I experience.

Nevertheless, you do not have to keep the BB hooked up to the BES to keep the IT policy on there. Just activate it and assign the "no phone" IT Policy, then remove it from the server. Alternatively you can delete the phone module.

I made up a policy 'phone disabled' and assigned to a phone, and checked phone doesn't work. After that, I deleted the user from BES. After that if the user wipes out the phone, does the policy stay?

Yes, the policy will stay.

It does! Thank you so much! I'm surpised that none of Sprint person can't assist us to do this way. They lie that BES CAL includes Exchange CAL and keep saying they can't disable phone function without BES, but sell BES CAL for each phone. Anybody uses Blackberry for only data plan should be careful with Sprint playing their customers.

1. BES CAL doesn't include Exchange CAL.
2. Sprint/Nextel can exclude Phone plan, but doesn't block calling in/out, then they charge every expensive for each call made.
3. Disabling phone can be done with only few BES CAL by assiging policy with 'phone disable' and delete the user. Then Policy stays until reinstalling Blackberry OS.

This way, you don't have to pay BES CAL and Exchange CAL if you use only data and use carrier provided email.

Yep! You've figured it out!