How To Delay Delivery Of All Messages With The Option To Send Messages Immediately In Microsoft Outlook 2007

How many times have you sent an email message only to realize you made a mistake…or cooled down after composing a message you had regret sending? With Microsoft Outlook 2007, you can delay the delivery of one message, before sending, by selecting the Options tab, and in the More Options group on the Ribbon, select Delay Delivery. In the Message Options window, check the Do not deliver before: box and select the date and time for delayed message delivery.

 If you decide you do not want to send the message, or made a mistake, you can select it from the Outbox and edit or delete the message before the message is sent. This works great for one message, but a better method is to create a rule to delay sending all messages, with the capability to send any message immediately. Here's how…

1 - Open Outlook and from the menu, select Tools \ Rules and Alerts… then click New Rule…

2 - In step 1 of the rules wizard, under Start from a Blank Rule, click Check messages after sending, then click Next.

3 - For Select Conditions… section, click Next, then click OK to accept message that the rule will apply to every message.

4 - In Select Actions(s) window, check defer delivery by a number of minutes. Then in the bottom section click on the blue underlined words a number of

5 - In the Deferred Delivery window, select he number of minutes you want to delay message delivery and click OK.

6 - Click Next

7 - In the Select exception(s) (if necessary) window, check except if the subject contains specific words. Then in the bottom window click on the blue underlined words specify words.

10 - In the Search Text enter a period followed by two spaces, ".  " (with out quotes) and click Add, then OK.

11 - Click Next and specify a name for the rule such as Deliver Now. Click Finish then OK to close Rules and Alerts.

Test sending a message with and without ".  " (with out quotes) to make sure the rule is working properly.

When using the message delay rule, if you need to edit the message with-in the time before delivery, go to the Outbox and make any changes neccassary (or delete the message). Any messages that have been edited, while in the Outbox will need to be sent manually since the rule will not process. For POP3, you need to be connected first, before the rule will process, otherwise it will sit in the Outbox until the connection is made. If you are connected to an Exchange server, the rule will process normally.