Last week I wrote about granting Reviewer permissions to your Outlook calendar with other people on your Microsoft Exchange Server. But Reviewer permissions only allow someone to view your appointments, not change them. Sometimes you may want someone to be able to add or edit appointments on your calendar, or sometimes you may want them to only see your free/busy time, and not the details of your appointments. Either way, you’ll need to go in and edit the person’s sharing permissions.
Edit Sharing Permissions (Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010)
- Click on the Calendar button to go to Calendar view.
- In the left hand column, right click on the calendar you want to share and select Properties.
- In the window that opens, click on the Permissions tab.
- In the Name column, click on the name of the person you want to change the permissions for. Their current permission level is indicated in the column beside their name.
- In the Permissions section, click on the Permission Level drop down arrow.
- Select a permission level (descriptions below). You can customize the permissions in the Read, Write, Delete items, and Other sections below.
- When you’re finished adjusting the permissions, click OK.
You may notice the Add button below the list of names. You can also add a person to grant permissions to using this button.
Default Permissions
Notice that one of the names in the Name column is Default. This is the permission level everyone on your Exchange Server has. Unless you want to share your calendar with EVERYONE in your organization, I suggest leaving the default permissions at Free/Busy time. This will allow people to see when you’re busy when they send you a meeting request. If you don’t want people in your organization to see your Free/Busy time, change the Default permission to None by selecting it in the Read section.
Permission Levels
If you’re not sure what each permission level means, you can select one from the Permission Level drop down box and see what options are selected below. I’ve summarized the permission levels below.
- None- the person cannot see any information related to your calendar.
- Free/Busy time – the person can see when you’re free or busy
- Free/Busy time, subject, location - the person can see the time, subject, and location of your appointments
- Contributor - the person can put appointments on your calendar but cannot see details of existing appointments
- Reviewer - the person can read everything related to an appointment (except a private one) and see folders, but not subfolders
- Nonediting Author - the person can see appointment details, create appointments (but not folders), and delete the appointments they created
- Author - the person can see appointment details, create appointments, edit appointments they created, and delete appointments they created
- Publishing Author - the person can do everything an Author can, plus create subfolders
- Editor - the person can create items, edit all appointments, delete any appointment, and see the full details of all appointments
- Publishing Editor - the person can do everything an Editor can, plus create subfolders
- Owner - the person will have the same permissions to your calendar that you have
Is there anyway to allow users to have full access to my calendar except block them from editing appointments that myself (owner) has created?
Hi Chris. I think this will do it – give them Publishing Editor permissons, then in the Write box, uncheck Edit All and check Edit Own.
Is ther any way of allowing another user to add appointments to my calendar but only to see my appointmments as busy. The contributor setting does not allow them to add appointments. I am using OWA and Outlook 2010
Hi Ian,
You would have to do this as a custom setting. Just select Free/Busy time in the Read section and Create Items in the Write section, and make sure they don’t have any other permissions they shouldn’t.
Holly
Just want to confirm that if I share ten calendars with ten other people and grant them all access, we can all view and edit the calendars as we see fit and we will all be able to see them, correct?
As long as you grant those ten people access to all ten calendars, and they have the folder set to visible and give them editing rights, then they should all be able to see and edit all of the calendars.
Hiya
Is there a way to share my calendar with colleagues only allowing them to see the ‘headlines’ of an appointment? I want them to be able to see the title, times and location, but not nay text or attachments that are included.
I had originally set them up as reviewers but this enables them to view everything (unless private of course), so set custom permissions of free/busy time, subject, location – when they then open my calendar on their PCs, it’s blank!
Any help gratefully received!
Many thanks
Hi Ann,
Select Reviewer from the drop down. After you do that, in the Read section, change the selection to “Free/Busy time, subject, location.”
Cheers,
Holly
Hi,
I work in a small office of 5-8 people and we share one calendar that is controlled by the administration manager (me). My calendar is the main office one – the girls book in appointments for our inspectors, send me the invite, I put it into my calendar and update. They then have my calendar side by side to theirs so they can see what inspector is available for jobs, etc.
We do not have exchange, nor wish to use it via the web (we have limited web access for business reasons/people abusing web rights).
Previously, I had the calendar set up and it used to update every half an hour or so. No issues. However, I have just received a new computer as the old one died – and now, whenever I send through my calendar via email to the girls that require the calendar, it will not update when I put in new appointments.
I am not 100% sure if the previous calendar was set up via email or not, but I cannot find another way to share the email, and on the net it simply tells me HOW to share via email – but never says that it will update as appointments are added or changed.
How do I sent my calendar via email and ensure that all the workers that need the calendar will see the updates regularly?
Hello,
I would like to see an example of changing permissions on a new calendar, not the default calendar supplied by Outlook. I have added a second calendar, but can’t seem to configure it to show others the free/busy time associated with that calendar. My guess is that since the “Permissions level” pull-down for the new calendar doesn’t include “Free/busy” of any sort that I will not be able to allow others to see my blocked times.
Can you explain how to use a non-default calendar to show free/busy time as it is done in the default calendar (i.e., without having to configure sharing for each user, via permissions or invitation)?
Regards,
Todd
I just got Outlook at work and I don’t have a work position where anyone needs to post items on my calendar. Is there a way to disengage anyone from putting things on my calendar. A way to make it private so to speak so no one has access to it at all?
Thank you.
Hi Michelle,
By default, people do not have permission to put things on your calendar, so I don’t think you need to worry about it. If you find that people do have access to add things, set the Default to None, or just Free/Busy, and remove anyone listed as having permission.
Hi there.
I have created a shared department calendar, and gave full permissions to every department member.
Now when someone creates a meeting on that shared calendar and invites others, it looks like I’m th emeeting organizer and have sent the invitation. Help? If a coworker creates and shares an event I want the event to look like it’s coming from her.
Thanks!
Did you ever figure this out? I also am looking for this.
Thanks,
I am having the same problem. Did you ever get this figured out?
I have a secretary that no longer is managing her bosses calendar. We have removed her access to manager the calendar but she is still getting daily notices when someone creates an appointment for her old boss. I have check both users calendars, accounts in exchange console and can’t find why she is still receiving notices. Any help is appreciated.
thanks,
Bill,
It may be that she’s listed as a delegate. Here is Microsoft’s information on delegates:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/allow-someone-else-to-manage-your-mail-and-calendar-HA010075081.aspx
Thanks!
Ben
I have 3 staff members in a department who are delegates on each others calendar using outlook 2010 and the department directors calendar, the 3 staff can create and edit each others calendar but only 1 of the 3 people can create or edit the directors calendar. All permissions are the same on each account but they still cannot create or edit on directors calendar.
I am trying to give a user of outlook 2010 permission to add to my outlook 2007 calendar. I followed all the steps above but when he goes to add an event on my calendar it stills sends me a meeting request instead of just adding to my calendar like other outlook 2007 users. Is there a setting that I need to change for outlook 2010 users? Thanks.
I would like to share my calendar with my boss and she would like to share hers with me. We would like to be able to edit each others calenders, however, the “Share Calender” button and the “Calendar Permissions” buttons are greyed out….therefore we can not click on them. Thoughts?