Giving Other People Permission to Access Your Outlook Folder(s)

You can allow other users to access your Outlook mailbox in two different ways:

You can make the person a “delegate”, which allows them to send email, set up meetings, etc. on your behalf. When a delegate sends something on behalf of another person, the words “on behalf of” actually appear in the message. The only way that person A can be given permission to send “AS” person B, meaning the message appears to be coming from person B, is through permissions on the server. This must be done by an authorized account administrator.

You can grant permissions through the “properties” of a specific folder. This provides the same type of permission as delegate, with the exception that the person can’t act on your behalf.

For a person to be able to open another person’s Outlook folder (in their own folder hierarchy), they must be given permission to the “Outlook Today” or root folder. Even delegates can’t do this unless they have been granted explicit permission to the Outlook Today folder.

How to make someone a Delegate

Click on Tools à Select Options à Click on the Delegates tab

Click Add, and select the user(s) from the Global Address List, either by double clicking on the name, or highlighting the name, and clicking “Add” to move them to the window on the right side of the list of names. à Click OK.

A window will appear that looks like the one above. These are the default settings for a delegate. You can modify these settings to grant more or fewer permissions to the delegate. Please note the check boxes that can be used for additional permissions.

After you have set the permissions, the way you want them, click OK. This window will close, and your original window will appear. à Click apply à Click OK.

The following is an in-depth listing of the delegate permissions, and what they mean. At the end of the permissions list are several notes. You may want to read these, as they give further information regarding delegate status. The following list is taken directly from the Outlook help files.

Delegate Access permissions

Following are the levels of permission that a delegate can be granted:

Author

With Author permission, as a delegate, you can read and create items, and modify and delete items you create. For example, a delegate can create task requests and meeting requests directly in the manager's Task or Calendar folder, and then send either item on the manager's behalf.

Editor

With Editor permission, as a delegate, you can do everything an Author can do, plus modify and delete the items the manager created.

Reviewer

With Reviewer permission, as a delegate, you can read items; for example a delegate with Reviewer permission can read messages in another person's Inbox.

Notes With author or editor permissions, the delegate has send-on-behalf-of permission. Sent messages contain both the manager's and delegate's names. Message recipients see the manager's name in the Sent On Behalf Of box and the delegate's name in the From box.

If a delegate needs permission to deal with meeting requests and responses only, the manager can select the Send meeting requests and responses only to my delegates, not to me check box on the Delegates tab and does not need to grant permission to his Inbox. Meeting requests and responses will go directly to the delegate's Inbox. The delegate will, however, need editor permission to the manager's Calendar folder, because once they respond to the meeting on behalf of the manager, the meeting is automatically added to the manager's Calendar folder.

Granting folder permissions to another person

As stated in the second paragraph, above, you can grant permissions through the “properties” of a specific folder. With your Outlook open, right click on the folder to which you want to grant permission à Select “Properties” à Click on the “Permissions” tab.

The user(s) name(s) will appear in the “Name” box. Highlight the name, and select the level of permission you wish to grant that person, from the “Permission Level” dropdown list. After selecting the basic permission level from the dropdown list, you can modify those permissions further by using the check boxes and radio buttons at the bottom of the window. When you are done setting permissions, click apply à click ok.

The following is an in-depth listing of the folder permissions, and what they mean. The following list is taken directly from the Outlook help files.

With this permission level (or role)	You can
Owner	Create, read, modify, and delete all items and files, and create subfolders. As the folder owner, you can change the permission levels others have for the folder. (Does not apply to delegates.)
Publishing Editor	Create, read, modify, and delete all items and files, and create subfolders. (Does not apply to delegates.)
Editor	Create, read, modify, and delete all items and files.
Publishing Author	Create and read items and files, create subfolders, and modify and delete items and files you create. (Does not apply to delegates.)
Author	Create and read items and files, and modify and delete items and files you create.
Contributor	Create items and files only. The contents of the folder do not appear. (Does not apply to delegates.)
Reviewer	Read items and files only.
Custom	Perform activities defined by the folder owner. (Does not apply to delegates.)
None	You have no permission. You can't open the folder.