Shared Exchange Mailbox
I'm trying to find the proper way to setup a shared mailbox on an Exchange server running Windows 2003 Small Business. The network consists of 3 laptop users, one with XP Pro/Office 2003 and the other two with Windows/Office 2000. They would like to use one email address for their company, give all three users access to the inbox and be able to reply with that email address. I setup a mailbox and gave the users access, but when they replied the sent message went into the individual's sent items. They want to know if anyone replies to a message, so is there a way to set it up so everyone has access to the same inbox and sent items?
Thanks.
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ASKED:
November 9, 2006 4:40 AM
UPDATED:
November 23, 2006 3:54 AM
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Answer Wiki:
Hi.
At first, since Exchange 2000 you need a 1:1 relation between an user account and a mailbox. Now user can have more then one mailbox and now mailbox can have more then one owner.
You can do this:
- All off your users need an own mailbox and mail address
- create a "dummy" user for the shared mailbox and mail address
- open the mailbox with outlook and share the inbox (and all needed folders) to the other users with level 8
- Edit the security settings of the dummy user in AD and add the users to the ACL. Add the rights "send as" and "receive as".
- Add the inbox and all needed folders from "dummys" mailbox to the outlook profile of your users.
- Add the field "From" to the outlook new mail window
All users should have access to the folders of the "dummy" user, now. And all users should have the right to send mail with this one mail address if they select it for the "From" field.
To share send mails you can create a outlook rule what moves the mails from the personal outbox of each user to the outbox of the shared mailbox.
Alternative you can use a mail enabled public folder for this task. But I'm not sure if "send as" is possible for a public folder in exchange 2003.
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Ouh, I’m sorry. It must be:
NO user can have more then one mailbox and NO mailbox can have more then one owner.
sorry for confusions…
We have several mailboxes set up this way in our organization.
Our help desk, for instance, has a mailbox they send notifications to the organization from. Of course we do not want people to reply to these emails so the mailbox sends a bounce-back if anyone tries to reply to any of these messages telling them they do not have permission to send to that mailbox and to call the help desk if they have any problems or questions.
Now in order for everyone in helpdesk to send from that mailbox and track what has been sent they have to open that mailbox as its own profile.
Set your outlook to prompt for a profile, then when you open outlook you will be prompted for which profile to use. Click “new” and add the other mailbox in.
Users can add the mailbox to their folder list, but then if they reply to email that way the sent items go into their personal sent items folder. However if it is on their folder list, they can monitor it for new mail, then close their outlook and re-open it as the other profile to reply.
This is the only way I know of to accomplish this.
Yup, you can use a folder rule on their sent folder to move the sent items to the shared mailbox sent folder. Probably the easy fix to what you have already done. I suspect that combining “send on behalf of” plus a rule to move email with the shared email address as sender is the best solution. That way each user can also send personal and interoffice messages (someone out of office or really on vacation) under their own name as well.
Public folders don’t have sent folders unless you create and fake one — and again use folder rules to move the email.
I can’t remember for sure as I haven’t laid hands on Exchange connected email for quite some time — but I think if you the “Send on Behalf of” settings as if the shared email folder owner (dummy) was on vacation the sent email can end up in the right sent folder. But there is a variable in that equation I can’t remember.
Another option is to have the users each use Outlook Web Access to connect to the shared mailbox. That way they have access to any folders in the shared mailbox, in case they want to create subfolders for organizing messages, including the calendar. They can continue to use regular Outlook for their own e-mail. We sometimes add shared mailboxes to a user’s Outlook folder list just for the purpose of checking the mailbox for new mail. But then they use Outlook Web Access to reply, send new messages, and organize the mail. Another benefit of using this method is that it is completely anonymous, and replies go out from the shared mailbox name, not “on behalf of” the shared mailbox name.
Hmm…I can’t remember what happens if you make the shared mailbox MAPI connected and add their private mailbox POP3.
Or you could throw Outlook Express to hook up via IMAP to one account and Outlook to the other email account. I think IMAP can put sent mail on the server if configured right. Outlook would let them do private calendar appointments as well as shared and such. And besides I think only one user can directly log into an emailbox. You can test that by having someone log onto their own accoutn twice and try to open Outlook on both machines.
But! Here is a wicked idea. Run a second copy of Outlook with the credentials of the shared mailbox dummy user.
See middle of https://www.microsoft.com/mspress/books/sampchap/5021f.aspx
for some runas clues. But I am thinking this would only work for one person. You’d have to test it.
Or set up multiple Outlook profiles (one private and one shared)…though I think only one person would be able to logon to the shared mailbox directly.
You can configure Outlook to prompt for which profile to use when it starts.
Hmm…I can’t remember what happens if you make the shared mailbox MAPI connected and add their private mailbox POP3.
Or you could throw Outlook Express to hook up via IMAP to one account and Outlook to the other email account. I think IMAP can put sent mail on the server if configured right. Outlook would let them do private calendar appointments as well as shared and such. And besides I think only one user can directly log into an emailbox. You can test that by having someone log onto their own accoutn twice and try to open Outlook on both machines.
But! Here is a wicked idea. Run a second copy of Outlook with the credentials of the shared mailbox dummy user.
See middle of https://www.microsoft.com/mspress/books/sampchap/5021f.aspx
for some runas clues. But I am thinking this would only work for one person. You’d have to test it.
Or set up multiple Outlook profiles (one private and one shared)…though I think only one person would be able to logon to the shared mailbox directly.
You can configure Outlook to prompt for which profile to use when it starts.