How To: Retrieve Sent Emails

We’ve all done it – hit the “send” button and yelled “DOH!”. You might have forgotten an attachment or hit “reply all” instead of just reply. If you use Outlook you can use a workaround… delaying all outgoing mails for a couple of minutes before they actually send. That gives you a bit of breathing space to capture and edit if necessary!

• In Outlook, click on Tools -> Rules and Alerts.
• Under the “E-mail Rules” tab click on “New Rule”.
• Choose “Start from a blank rule” and select “Check messages after sending”.
• Click the “Next” button.
• Select the condition “on this machine only” (you may have to scroll down to the bottom of the list).
• Click the “Next” button.
• Select “defer delivery by a number of minutes”.
• Click “a number of” in the bottom box and change it to the length of time you want to set for delay. I use 2 minutes and find it is enough but use your own judgment here.
• Click the “Next” button.
• This screen gives you options for exclusions to the rule — just skip it by clicking the “Next” button.
• Finish the rule set up by naming the rule. “Doh-saver” is a good one!
• Be sure the box is checked to “Turn on this rule” and click “Finish”.