The short answer is, yes but the long answer is you probably do not want to do that.
If you are wanting to delete a former employee from your Microsoft Office 365 accounts so that you can reassign the license to someone else or cancel a license altogether and stop paying for it, all you need to do is convert the mailbox to a shared mailbox. Shared mailboxes are FREE and they provide both out of office bounce alerts and can have their messages forwarded to a manager/supervisor.
Here is how you convert an employee Microsoft 365 mail box to a shared mailbox:
- Login to https://portal.office.com
- Click the ADMIN icon on the left rail
- Expand USERS
- Click on the user in question
- Click the MAIL tab (top right)
- Click CONVERT TO SHARED MAILBOX
- Complete the Convert to Shared Mailbox wizard
![how to convert a Microsoft 365 mailbox to a shared mail box](https://www.urtech.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/how-to-convert-a-Microsoft-365-mailbox-to-a-shared-mail-box-1024x503.jpg)
A shared mailbox allows others in your company to access that person’s old mailbox but doesn’t cost your company anything. And other than direct access by a user, a shared mailbox is just the same as any other mailbox. Things that things like forwarding and out of office alerts/ autoresponders function as normal.
This means you can now safely delete that user without losing their email or stopping the forwarding or out of office alert auto responder.
- Login to https://portal.office.com
- Click the ADMIN icon on the left rail
- Expand USERS
- Click on the user in question
- Select DELETE USER (top menu bar, among other places)
- Select the features you want including GIVE ANOTHER USER ACCESS TO the users email box
![how to delete an Microsoft 365 user properly with auto reply and forward](https://www.urtech.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/how-to-delete-an-Microsoft-365-user-properly-with-auto-reply-and-forward-1024x638.jpg)
That’s it. At this point your former employee has been soft deleted. If you want to know what soft delete means, click here for a brief explanation.
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