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Managing Your Outlook Mailbox

Because of limited resources, faculty and staff Mailboxes are limited to 500 Mb in storage space. The e-mail server will be configured to follow these procedures:

• If a Mailbox reaches 475 Mb in size, a warning message will go out to the user.
• If a Mailbox exceeds 500 Mb in size, the user will not be able to send out any messages. The user, however, will be able to receive messages.

A user that exceeds the 500 Mb limit can easily rectify the problem by permanently deleting or removing messages.

Faculty and staff are asked to manage their mailboxes so that this limit is not reached. Here are some tips on how to manage your Mailbox.

• To Determine How Big Your Mailbox Is:
  1. In your Outlook folders List, right-click on the top-level folder called "Mailbox". Your name is next to this icon as well.
  2. At the bottom of the menu that appears, click on "Properties for Mailbox . . ."
  3. In the window that appears, Click on the General tab at the top.
  4. Click on the Folder Size button. In the window that appears, you can view the size of all of your sub-folders and determine where you can eliminate some items to free up Mailbox space
• Delete Your Sent Items
  • By Default, your Outlook saves a copy of every message you send. Delete these, especially those messages with an attachment. The attachment is likely a file (Word document, Image file, etc.) that you already have stored in your Z: drive. Cut out wasted space by eliminating redundant files.
• Delete Large Messages
  • Find Large Messages in a folder by sorting your messages by size.
  • If your Message Pane has a horizontal view of your messages, simply click on the Size button in your grey Message Fields bar to sort either in ascending or descending order.
  • Either delete entire message or, if there is an attachment, delete only the attachment by opening the message, right-clicking on the attachment icon and choosing Remove.
• Empty your Deleted Items folder
  • When you delete a message, it actually is moved to the Deleted Items folder and is not yet permanently deleted. To permanently delete your deleted items (and thereby free up space in your Mailbox) right-click on the Deleted Items folder and choose Empty Deleted Items Folder.
  • To have your Deleted Items folder automatically empty itself when you close Outlook, take the following steps:
    1. In Outlook, Click on the Tools menu
    2. Click on Options
    3. Click on the Other tab
    4. Check the "Empty the Deleted Items Folder Upon Exiting" checkbox.
    5. Click OK.
• Reduce Attachment Size
  • Often, when sending pictures or PowerPoint Presentations, the attachment size can be reduced. Sending excessively large pictures or other attachments might not only be a discourtesy to your recipient, but could also clog and crash an e-mail server.
• Empty your Junk Mail folder
  • There is also a folder called Junk Mail. To empty this folder, right-click on the folder and choose Empty Junk Mail Folder.

If you have any questions or need assistance with managing your Outlook Mailbox, please don't hesitate to contact an I.T. staff person or e-mail shbit@uwc.edu.