Viewing Another Mailbox

Sometimes you want to set up Outlook so that the user has access to not just his main mailbox but also to another user's mailbox. For example, you may create a user named Support so that your customers can send e-mail to [e-mail] to ask technical support questions. If you don't set up at least one user to read the Support mailbox, any mail sent to [e-mail] languishes unanswered. Assuming that that's not what you want, you can set up one or more users to access the Support mailbox and read and respond to its mail.

First, you must configure the Support user account's mailbox so that it grants access rights to the user you want to have access to the account. Follow these steps:

1. On the server, choose Start Active Directory Users and Computers, and then find and double-click the e-mail account that you want to access from another user's copy of Outlook.

   The Properties dialog box appears.

2. Click the Exchange Advanced tab and then click the Mailbox Rights button.

   The Permissions for Support dialog box appears and displays the Mailbox Rights tab, as shown in Figure 11-10.

   
   Figure 11-10: The Mailbox Rights tab.

3. Click the Add button.

   This step brings up the Select Users, Computers, or Groups dialog box.

4. Type the name of the user you want to grant access to and then click OK.

   You return to the Permissions for Support dialog box. The user you added is selected in the list of users with access to the mailbox.

5. Select the Allow check box for the Full Mailbox Access option to grant the user full access to the mailbox and then click OK.

   The Mailbox Rights dialog box is dismissed.

6. Click OK.

   The user Properties dialog box is dismissed.

After you grant access to the account, you can configure the user's copy of Outlook to read the Support account. Follow these steps:

1. On the user's computer, start Outlook and choose Tools E-mail Accounts.

   The E-mail Accounts dialog box (refer to Figure 11-6) is displayed.

2. Select the View or Change Existing E-Mail Accounts option and then click Next.

   The dialog box, as shown in Figure 11-11, is displayed. This dialog box lists the e-mail accounts that have been configured for the Outlook client.

   
   Figure 11-11: The e-mail accounts configured for an Outlook client.

3. Select the Microsoft Exchange Server account and then click the Change button.

   The Exchange Server Settings dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 11-12.

   
   Figure 11-12: The Exchange Server Settings dialog box.

4. Click the More Settings button and then click the Advanced tab.

   The Advanced tab of the Microsoft Exchange Server dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 11-13.

   
   Figure 11-13: The Advanced tab of the Microsoft Exchange Server dialog box.

5. Click the Add button.

   A dialog box prompts you for the name of the mailbox you want to add.

6. Type the name of the mailbox you want to add and then click OK.

   The mailbox is added to the list box in the Microsoft Exchange Server dialog box.

7. Click OK.

   You return to the Exchange Settings dialog box.

8. Click Next and then click Finish.

   You're done! You can now view the Support mailbox.

Tip 

To view the mailbox, choose View Folder List to open the Folder List window in Outlook. Then double-click the Support mailbox in the list to open it.