C
Cathi
We have some issues sharing an Outlook 2007 account. We have a shared support
account, which is our primary mechanism for contacting clients (to and from).
We can all view the email account, and contacts list (we have Publishing
Editor rights). None of us actually log into the support account, we just use
the permissions to view email and contacts.
1. When we compose a new message, and want to enter the client’s name in the
“To†field, it won’t look up the names from the support account. If we click
on the “To†button, we have the option to choose contact lists, but not the
support contact list.
2. We have several distribution lists – when we create a message to a list,
it enters the list name in the “To†field, with a “+†expander next to the
name. When we click the + we get this: “; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Joe Bloggs†(where
Joe Bloggs exists in the personal or global address list) – all the contacts
from the support contact list don’t show up.
3. When we reply to an email in the support inbox, the reply goes into our
personal Sent Items, not the Sent Items of the support mailbox. We can
specify (in the Options ribbon) to save the message to the Sent Items of the
support mailbox, and have been getting into the habit of doing this – but it
doesn’t actually go there. It appears in our personal Outbox instead (we have
been copying them across to support’s Sent Items, but automating is necessary)
4. Signatures – we have each set up internal and external signatures, but we
previously had a special signature for the support account - this was just a
html file which resided on the network. In Outlook it seems possible only to
have signatures saved for each individual’s account – I have saved a
“Support†signature in my account, but to my knowledge this can’t be shared
with others in our group, and if we wanted to make changes, everyone would
have to do this individually (leading to inconsistency)
5. When one of us “reads†an email in the support inbox, the “read statusâ€
changes for everybody else’s view of that inbox (there are at least half a
dozen of us who regularly check this inbox, so this happens quite regularly).
This makes it quite tricky to keep track of which messages have actually been
read, need to be followed up or passed onto someone else, etc. Ideally the
‘read status’ settings for the support mailbox could be set independently,
that is the read status in the support inbox is managed separately for
everyone with a view on it. Otherwise individuals can change their settings
for when messages change status from “unread†to “readâ€, but we would have to
have the whole team make this change in order for the view of the support
inbox to be preserved. Note that we have a support position here, so one
person can be the ‘owner’ of this inbox and be responsible for managing it
(i.e. can decide when the status should change from ‘unread’ to ‘read’. I’m
also aware that we could use categories and/or flags to manage messages in
this inbox, though both are new to how we work with this, so any advice from
similar situations would be most useful. Are there any other means for
managing this?
6. I have noticed that when I reply to a message in the support inbox, the
draft is saved to my own mailbox’s drafts folder (not the drafts folder in
support...). Maybe this is related to the first three issues above?
Have we setup sharing a common support email and contacts scenario, or is
there a better way to do this and resolve the above.
Any info would be gratefully appreciated.
account, which is our primary mechanism for contacting clients (to and from).
We can all view the email account, and contacts list (we have Publishing
Editor rights). None of us actually log into the support account, we just use
the permissions to view email and contacts.
1. When we compose a new message, and want to enter the client’s name in the
“To†field, it won’t look up the names from the support account. If we click
on the “To†button, we have the option to choose contact lists, but not the
support contact list.
2. We have several distribution lists – when we create a message to a list,
it enters the list name in the “To†field, with a “+†expander next to the
name. When we click the + we get this: “; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Joe Bloggs†(where
Joe Bloggs exists in the personal or global address list) – all the contacts
from the support contact list don’t show up.
3. When we reply to an email in the support inbox, the reply goes into our
personal Sent Items, not the Sent Items of the support mailbox. We can
specify (in the Options ribbon) to save the message to the Sent Items of the
support mailbox, and have been getting into the habit of doing this – but it
doesn’t actually go there. It appears in our personal Outbox instead (we have
been copying them across to support’s Sent Items, but automating is necessary)
4. Signatures – we have each set up internal and external signatures, but we
previously had a special signature for the support account - this was just a
html file which resided on the network. In Outlook it seems possible only to
have signatures saved for each individual’s account – I have saved a
“Support†signature in my account, but to my knowledge this can’t be shared
with others in our group, and if we wanted to make changes, everyone would
have to do this individually (leading to inconsistency)
5. When one of us “reads†an email in the support inbox, the “read statusâ€
changes for everybody else’s view of that inbox (there are at least half a
dozen of us who regularly check this inbox, so this happens quite regularly).
This makes it quite tricky to keep track of which messages have actually been
read, need to be followed up or passed onto someone else, etc. Ideally the
‘read status’ settings for the support mailbox could be set independently,
that is the read status in the support inbox is managed separately for
everyone with a view on it. Otherwise individuals can change their settings
for when messages change status from “unread†to “readâ€, but we would have to
have the whole team make this change in order for the view of the support
inbox to be preserved. Note that we have a support position here, so one
person can be the ‘owner’ of this inbox and be responsible for managing it
(i.e. can decide when the status should change from ‘unread’ to ‘read’. I’m
also aware that we could use categories and/or flags to manage messages in
this inbox, though both are new to how we work with this, so any advice from
similar situations would be most useful. Are there any other means for
managing this?
6. I have noticed that when I reply to a message in the support inbox, the
draft is saved to my own mailbox’s drafts folder (not the drafts folder in
support...). Maybe this is related to the first three issues above?
Have we setup sharing a common support email and contacts scenario, or is
there a better way to do this and resolve the above.
Any info would be gratefully appreciated.