Default retention policy for Inbox

Question

In the web version of Outlook with an Exchange Online mailbox, right-clicking on the Inbox allows of selection of Assign Policy, which displays only the single, checked item Use parent folder policy. This is difficult to interpret since a) the Inbox itself seems to have no parent folder, and b) the policy for the account seems to be Default MRM Policy in the Exchange Admin Center > Compliance Management > Retention Policies, and the policy has a long list of Retention Tags, with the default tag indicated as 2 year move to archive.

If you create a new Policy, you can add any of the existing Retention Tags, but not select a new default.

If you add a new Retention Tag, you cannot select it to be the default.

If you edit the default Retention Tag, you cannot set it to be Never Delete.

If the goal was to have a Never Delete / Non-Archived default policy on the Inbox (which seems not to be a selectable option), what is the simplest way to get as close to that goal as possible?

Please understand, I am not saying that this is a "good" goal or something I would recommend to anyone (for the many reasons you are probably thinking up right now), but it is what has been requested, so ... 

Thank you and best regards.

Answer 1

Hi RB[ABC],

Thank you for your question. Please check below answers of your questions:

1. “If you create a new Policy, you can add any of the existing Retention Tags, but not select a new default”.

If the “new default” means the new retention tag you created, then the answer is yes, you can select your custom retention tag when creating a new retention policy. For your reference: Add retention tags to or remove retention tags from a retention policy.

2. “If you add a new Retention Tag, you cannot select it to be the default”.

There are three kinds of retention tags:

• Applied automatically to entire mailbox (default) Select this option to create a default policy tag (DPT).
• Applied automatically to a specific folder Select this option to create a retention policy tag (RPT) for a default folder such as Inbox or Deleted Items.
• Applied by users to items and folders (Personal) Select this option to create personal tags.

So the answer is yes, you can create a new default retention tag. Details please refer to this article: Create a Retention Policy.

3. “If you edit the default Retention Tag, you cannot set it to be Never Delete”.

Based on my test, it is editable to change the default retention policy to be Never Delete. Like below picture:

 

4. If the goal was to have a Never Delete / Non-Archived default policy on the Inbox (which seems not to be a selectable option), what is the simplest way to get as close to that goal as possible?

The answer is yes, you can have a Never Delete/Non-Archived default policy on the Inbox. The steps are as followings:

(1)    Create a new retention policy tag (RPT):

(2)    Create a new retention policy and add above retention tag:

    

(3)    Sign in Outlook Web APP, right-click Inbox and apply this retention policy. By default, the new policy will take up to 7 days in Exchange Online for the new retention settings to be applied to the mailboxes. For your reference: Set up an archive and deletion policy for mailboxes in your Office 365 organization.

(4)    Open Outlook client, right-click the Inbox folder and click Properties, AutoAchive, select the check box before Do not archive items in this folder, click OK.

Hope above information helps. Feel free to share the result with us and if you need further assistance, please let me know and provide us specific information about your concerns and detailed steps about you have tried.

Regards,

Jennifer

Answer 2

Also, if an account has archiving disabled, what happens when 2 years expires under the default tag (2 years move to archive)? Retain or delete?

Answer 3

Hi RB[ABC],

Do you have any updates with us?

Regards,

Jennifer

Answer 4

Thank you for your detailed reply.

These details will help implement a new policy which we shall create soon, and then we will post how it went.

Waiting to schedule a convienient time to work on this with the computer owner.

Answer 5

Hi RB[ABC],

Feel free to share the result with us at your convenience and if you still have any questions with the retention policy, we will happy to help you further.

Looking forward to your reply.

Regards,

Jennifer