Reply to in VBA using Outlook mail

Question

I am trying to get emails that I send via Outlook mail to reply to a specific email address. .reply

Can you also change the .from?

I get errors on both of these

Answer 1

Hi @Elsa Piek   

As the Q&A Assistant mentioned, the .From property is not writable. To choose a specific sender, you can use .SendUsingAccount. 

Note: The sender account must already exist in the Outlook profile. You can verify this under File > Info > Account Information. 

Below is a script that creates a reply and sets a specific account as the sender: 

Sub ReplyWithSpecificAccount() 
    Dim oMail As Outlook.MailItem 
    Dim oReply As Outlook.MailItem 
    Dim oAccount As Outlook.Account 
    Dim sAccountEmail As String 
    
    ' *** SET YOUR DESIRED SENDER ACCOUNT HERE *** 
    sAccountEmail = "SpecificYourAccount" 
    
    ' Get the currently selected email 
    If Application.ActiveExplorer.Selection.Count = 0 Then 
        MsgBox "Please select an email to reply to.", vbExclamation 
        Exit Sub 
    End If 
    
    Set oMail = Application.ActiveExplorer.Selection.Item(1) 
    
    ' Create the reply 
    Set oReply = oMail.Reply 
    
    ' Loop through accounts to find the matching one 
    Dim accountFound As Boolean 
    accountFound = False 
    
    For Each oAccount In Application.Session.Accounts 
        If LCase(oAccount.SmtpAddress) = LCase(sAccountEmail) Then 
            oReply.SendUsingAccount = oAccount 
            accountFound = True 
            Exit For 
        End If 
    Next oAccount 
    
    If Not accountFound Then 
        MsgBox "Account '" & sAccountEmail & "' not found in Outlook." & vbCrLf & _ 
               "Please check the email address and try again.", vbExclamation 
        Set oReply = Nothing 
        Exit Sub 
    End If 
    
    ' Display the reply for editing before sending 
    oReply.Display 
    
    ' Clean up 
    Set oReply = Nothing 
    Set oMail = Nothing 
    Set oAccount = Nothing 
End Sub 

Please review this and let me know whether it applies to your situation. 

If you need any additional support or have questions, feel free to reach out at any time. 

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Answer 2

In Outlook VBA, .Reply creates a reply item and .From cannot be set directly on a MailItem.

To create a reply and change the sender, use the Reply method to get a reply MailItem, then set its SendUsingAccount (not .From) to one of the accounts configured in Outlook:

Sub ReplyFromSpecificAccount()
    Dim orig As Outlook.MailItem
    Dim reply As Outlook.MailItem

    ' Original message (for example, the currently selected item)
    Set orig = Application.ActiveExplorer.Selection(1)

    ' Create the reply
    Set reply = orig.Reply

    ' Use a specific account to send the reply
    Dim acc As Outlook.Account
    For Each acc In Application.Session.Accounts
        If acc.SmtpAddress = "service@example.com" Then
            Set reply.SendUsingAccount = acc
            Exit For
        End If
    Next acc

    reply.Display   ' or reply.Send
End Sub

Key points based on the Outlook object model in the context:

• MailItem.Reply is a method that “creates a reply, pre-addressed to the original sender, from the original message” and returns a MailItem object representing the reply.
• MailItem.Reply is also exposed as an event (MailItem.Reply event) that fires when the user clicks Reply or the Reply method is called. In the event handler, the reply item is passed as the Response object, and the operation can be canceled by setting Cancel = True.
• The reply item is always a MailItem object.

If using the Reply event to adjust the reply before it is shown/sent:

Public WithEvents myItem As Outlook.MailItem

Sub Initialize_Handler()
    Set myItem = Application.ActiveInspector.CurrentItem
End Sub

Private Sub myItem_Reply(ByVal Response As Object, Cancel As Boolean)
    Dim reply As Outlook.MailItem
    Set reply = Response

    ' Example: change SaveSentMessageFolder
    Set reply.SaveSentMessageFolder = myItem.Parent

    ' Here you could also set reply.SendUsingAccount as above
End Sub

.From is not a writable property on MailItem in this context; use SendUsingAccount to control which mailbox/account sends the reply, and ensure that account is already configured in the Outlook profile.

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References:

• MailItem.Reply event (Outlook)
• MailItem.Reply method (Outlook)