How to Choose a VoIP Reseller Program: MSP Checklist
Tom Reed · Updated 23 October 2026
The right VoIP reseller program lets you own the customer relationship and the invoice, set your own prices, bring your own SIP carrier, and choose whether the platform is hosted for you or run on your own server. Before you sign up, check who bills the end customer, who owns each customer's tenant, how branding works, what the trial and approval process looks like, and how good the partner docs and support are.
This guide is for MSPs, ITSPs, VoIP providers and IT resellers comparing programmes. It's vendor-neutral until the last main section, where we explain how the SessionPBX Partner Programme answers the same questions. Teams Phone and Teams Business, mentioned there, are SessionPBX plans, not Microsoft Teams.
What is a VoIP reseller program, and who is it for?
A VoIP reseller program lets a business sell a hosted phone system to its own customers, under its own customer relationship. The vendor runs or licenses the platform; the reseller signs up the customer, sets them up, supports them and, in most reseller programmes, sends the invoice. It suits MSPs adding voice to an IT contract, ITSPs and VoIP providers who want a hosted PBX to put alongside their SIP trunks, and IT resellers whose customers keep asking about phones. If you've already picked a platform and want to know how to bundle it, our guide to packaging hosted PBX for MSPs and telecom resellers covers that side.
There's no single best VoIP reseller program for everyone. The right choice depends on how you bill, whether you want to run servers, which carriers you already use and how much of the customer experience you want to own. Use the checklist below on every programme you shortlist, then read the sections that follow for what to look for in each answer.
Questions to ask any VoIP reseller program
- Do I invoice my customer at my own price? Or does the vendor bill them directly?
- Is it a straight partner discount, or commissions and payouts? Find out how and when you get paid, if you do.
- Hosted, self-hosted or both? Can you mix the two across different customers?
- Which hosting regions are available? Can you choose a region per customer?
- Can I bring any SIP-compliant carrier? Or are you tied to the vendor's own trunks?
- Who creates and owns each customer tenant? And what happens to it if you leave the programme?
- How is branding applied? Ask about the logo, the in-app name and setup emails, and whether a change needs an app-store release.
- Which desktop and mobile apps are included? Check Windows, macOS, iOS and Android.
- How long is the trial, and who has to approve going paid? Know what happens at the end of a customer trial.
- How are partner applications approved? Is approval automatic or reviewed by a person?
- Where are the partner docs? Can you read them before you apply?
- What does vendor support cover, and what do I support? Agree the line before your first customer goes live.
Who bills the end customer: you or the vendor?
This is the first question to settle, because it decides how much of the relationship you own. Most VoIP partner programs fall into one of two models.
Resell and invoice. The vendor bills you, usually at a partner discount, and you invoice your customer at whatever price you choose. You can bundle voice with your managed services, put it on the same invoice as everything else and set your own terms.
- Pros: you own the customer, the pricing and the margin. Your customer sees one supplier: you.
- Cons: you carry the billing work and the credit risk. If a customer pays late, you still owe the vendor.
Referral or agent. You introduce the customer and the vendor bills them directly. You're paid a commission, sometimes for as long as the customer stays.
- Pros: little billing admin and no credit risk. It can suit a business that only occasionally sells voice.
- Cons: the vendor owns the invoice and often the relationship. You depend on the vendor's reporting to see what you're owed, and the customer may not think of the phone system as yours.
For an MSP or ITSP that wants voice to be part of its own service, the resell-and-invoice model usually fits better. Whichever model a programme uses, ask to see the partner terms before you apply, and read how payment works in practice.
Should the platform be hosted for you or self-hosted?
Some reseller programmes only offer a hosted platform. Others let approved partners run the software on their own servers. A few offer both. Neither is better in general; they suit different businesses.
Hosted vs self-hosted reseller platform
| Factor | Hosted | Self-hosted |
|---|---|---|
| Who runs servers and updates | The vendor hosts, updates and maintains the platform | You run the servers and apply updates yourself |
| Where it's hosted | In the vendor's hosting regions; check which ones and whether you can choose per customer | Wherever you put your server: your data centre or your cloud account |
| Customers per instance | Usually one tenant or project per customer on the vendor's platform | Many customer tenants on one server you control, each kept separate |
| Billing cadence | Often monthly, sometimes with an annual option | Often annual licences, plus your own server and hosting costs |
| Who it suits | MSPs and IT resellers who don't want to run voice infrastructure | ITSPs and VoIP providers with an operations team and their own infrastructure |
| What you need in-house | Someone to set up and support customers | Linux, network and security skills, monitoring and someone on call for the servers |
Hosted is the faster route for most MSPs. You get a working platform without building anything, and your team can focus on customers. Self-hosted gives you more control over where the system runs and how it's operated, but you take on the work that a hosted vendor would otherwise do.
If you're unsure, ask whether the programme lets you start hosted and add self-hosted later, and whether the partner terms are the same for both. If you need a refresher on how the pieces of a hosted system fit together, see our guide to the PBX phone system.
Can you bring your own SIP trunks and carrier?
Carrier freedom matters more to a hosted PBX reseller than almost anything else on this list. If the programme ties you to the vendor's own trunks, you can't use the carrier deals you already have, you can't move customers to a better rate later, and your margin on calls depends on someone else's price list.
Ask three things:
- Can I connect any SIP-compliant carrier? Or only carriers on an approved list?
- How does the trunk authenticate? By IP, by credentials or both, so it works with the carriers you already use.
- Who supplies the phone numbers? If you bring your own trunk, numbers usually come from your carrier, not the platform. Make sure that's clear to you and to your customers.
ITSPs and VoIP providers often want this most, because they already sell SIP trunks. Bringing your own carrier lets you sell the trunk and the hosted PBX together. Our guide to choosing a SIP trunk provider for a hosted PBX walks through how to compare carriers.
Who owns each customer's tenant and admin?
Every customer on a multi-tenant platform has a tenant: the space that holds their users, extensions, call flows and settings. Who creates that tenant, and who owns it, decides how much control you really have.
Look for a programme where you create each customer's tenant and stay the owner of it. That lets you set up users, change call flows and fix problems without raising a ticket with the vendor. Also check:
- Can the customer have their own admin access? Some customers want a named person who can add users. Agree who can change what before you hand over any access.
- Can you see all your customers in one place? A partner workspace saves time once you have more than a handful.
- What happens if you leave the programme? Ask whether tenants can move, and what notice and support you'd get.
Write down who has admin rights for each customer, on your side and theirs. Our guide to phone system admin permissions has a simple model you can reuse for each tenant.
How does app branding work, and what will customers see?
Branding is often the reason a reseller picks one programme over another. Your customers' staff use the softphone every day, so what they see on it shapes whose service they think it is.
Ask the vendor exactly what app logo branding covers:
- The logo and in-app name. Do your customers see your logo and product name inside the apps?
- Setup emails. Do invitations and setup emails carry your branding, or the vendor's?
- Platforms. Does the same branding appear on Windows, macOS, iOS and Android?
- App-store releases. Is branding applied inside a standard app, or does each change need a new app-store release? Releases add time and work every time you update a logo.
- Plan rules. Is app logo branding included, or an add-on? Check which plans include it before you quote a customer.
Be clear with customers about what's branded and what isn't. For example, an app that shows your logo inside it may still be listed under the vendor's name in the app store.
What should the trial, approval and onboarding process look like?
There are two processes to check: how you become a partner, and how each new customer goes from trial to paid service.
Becoming a partner. Find out whether you can apply without an account, whether approval is automatic or reviewed by a person, and what happens after approval. A reviewed application isn't a bad sign; it usually means the vendor wants to understand your business before switching on partner pricing.
Customer trials. Ask how long a customer trial lasts, how many trials you can run at once, and who has to approve the move to a paid subscription. If the reseller must actively buy the subscription to keep service running, put a reminder in your process so no customer is cut off by mistake.
Onboarding each customer. Check how users are invited, how apps are set up on phones and computers, and whether setup emails can carry your branding. The fewer SIP settings anyone types by hand, the fewer support calls you'll get.
Run your first trial as if it were a real customer. Our hosted PBX free trial checklist is written for end users, but the same steps work well as a partner's first internal test.
Where will your customers' data be hosted?
Some customers will ask where their phone system runs. As a reseller, you need a clear answer for each one.
Ask the vendor:
- Which hosting regions are available? And can you choose a region per customer, rather than one region for your whole partner account?
- Is each region separate? For example, whether each region has its own database.
- What's stored where? Call recordings, voicemail, messages and call history may each have their own answer.
- What happens if you self-host? Then the answer is wherever you put the server, and the responsibility is yours.
Choosing a region per customer lets you put a customer close to their team and meet their own requirements without running a separate platform. Our guide to phone system data residency explains the questions customers are likely to ask. This guide doesn't give legal advice, so point customers to their own advisers for anything regulatory.
How does the SessionPBX Partner Programme work?
Here's how the SessionPBX Partner Programme answers the questions above, using what the SessionPBX Partner Programme page says.
Who it's for. The programme is for PBX resellers, managed service providers, IT companies and communications providers. You resell SessionPBX, a complete business phone system, with your logo on the apps.
Billing. Approved partners get a partner discount on every seat, base and extra, hosted or self-hosted. You set your own price and invoice your customer, so there are no commissions to chase and no payouts to wait for.
Hosted or self-hosted. On hosted, SessionTalk hosts and maintains SessionPBX in the UK (London), the US (New York) or Singapore. You choose the region for each customer, and each region has its own database. Hosted plans offer monthly or annual billing. Self-hosted is for approved partners only: you run it on your own server, with annual licences and many customer tenants on one server, each kept separate.
Tenants. Each customer gets one SessionPBX project. You create it, you own it, and you manage extensions, numbers, the SIP trunk and call flows for that customer.
Carriers. SessionPBX is bring-your-own SIP trunk: you connect any SIP-compliant carrier. SessionPBX doesn't supply numbers or lines; numbers and calls come from your chosen carrier.
Apps and branding. Apps run on Windows, macOS, iOS and Android. App logo branding puts your logo and in-app product name on the softphones. It's included with Teams Business and available as an add-on on Teams Phone. Teams Phone and Teams Business are SessionPBX plans, not Microsoft Teams.
Applying. You don't need a portal account to apply, and every application is reviewed by hand.
Docs and pricing. The partner docs are at docs.sessiontalk.io/docs/partners and cover becoming a partner, customer workspaces, partner billing, app logo branding, bringing your own SIP trunk and partner support. Current partner pricing is on the partner programme page and in the partner portal.
If you want to see the phone system your customers would use, the SessionPBX hosted PBX page covers the features of each plan. When you're ready, apply to the SessionPBX Partner Programme.
FAQ
What's the difference between a reseller program and a referral (agent) program?
In a reseller program you buy from the vendor and invoice your customer at your own price, so you own the invoice and the relationship. In a referral or agent program, the vendor bills the customer directly and pays you a commission.
Do I need my own SIP trunks to resell a hosted PBX?
It depends on the programme. Some include trunks; others expect you to bring your own. With SessionPBX you bring any SIP-compliant carrier, and numbers and calls come from that carrier.
Can I put my own logo on the phone apps?
Many programmes offer some form of app logo branding, so check what it covers. On SessionPBX, app logo branding puts your logo and in-app product name on the softphones. It's included with Teams Business and an add-on on Teams Phone.
Should an MSP choose hosted or self-hosted?
Choose hosted if you don't want to run servers; the vendor looks after the platform and you look after customers. Self-hosted suits approved partners who want many customer tenants on their own server and have the skills to run it.
How long does it take to become a partner?
It varies by programme, and we won't guess at a timeframe. For SessionPBX, you don't need a portal account to apply, and SessionTalk reviews every application by hand.
Where do I find pricing?
SessionPBX partner pricing is on the partner programme page and in the partner portal once you're approved. For any other programme, ask for the partner terms and price list before you sign.
