All organizations rely on email, and in many cases multiple departments or groups of users require shared access to the same email account to facilitate efficiency and promote their responsive culture to their customers.
In MS Exchange you are able to create what we call a Shared Mailbox which allows a defined set of users simultaneously access to that mailbox.
This type of mailbox also existed on earlier versions of Exchange, but in Exchange 2013, Microsoft simplified the process.
The characteristics for shared mailboxes follow:
- The account associated with it is disabled by default
- No password is required
- Managed only by people with “full Access” or “Send as” permission
- Allows group of people to share common calendar
To create a shared mailbox you need to:
- login to the Exchange Admin Center, then click on Shared tab (Figure 1):
Figure 1:
b) Complete the next screen that appears as follows:
Figure 2:
Most of the above fields are obvious but the most important ones are:
Email Address: you have to specify the email address for the new shared mailbox. The domain is displayed by default, if you manage multiple domains, you can select the proper domain from the drop down list.
Full Access: Full Access users can act like the owners of the shared mailbox. They can perform multiple actions i.e.: create calendar items, contacts, read, view, delete and change email messages. Full Access type users cannot send email unless they have been set up with Send As permission.
Send As: This permission allows the user to impersonate the shared mailbox and have his/her email appear to originate from the shared mailboxes Display Name.
Mailbox database: if you manage multiple mailbox databases you must assign the shared mailbox to the corresponding mailbox database.
After the shared mailbox is created you can now open MS Outlook and you will see the new mailbox folder added to your list.
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