Sorry for the mis-understanding. Set the max receive size to 0 for the mailbox(es). That will prevent them from receiving email.

I am looking to disable a large number of users mailboxes for a period of time - this can range from 3 months to 12 months If I disable the mailbox it will get cleaned up after 28 days? If I remove the mailbox it will remove the user account. if there an alternative way to achieve this? The user will need to keep their mailbox and all their emails.

Try doing it in Active Directory Users And Computers, instead.Mobile OWA For Smartphone www.leederbyshire.com email a@t leederbyshire d.0.t c.0.m

I agree with Lee, use ADUC or a PS Script to disable the users in question. I know of no good way to say these 10 users are disabled to 3 months, but these other 10 are disabled for 6 months, thats going to be somewhat of a manual process unless you have a list/CSV of start and end dates, then you could script it. Other than that, just remember, eventhough you disable an AD account, the mailbox still receives email, so if you want to stop that, you have to set somehting like maxmessagesize of the mailbox to 0 or something like that.

The user account will still need to be active but the mailbox will not be active.

Sorry for the mis-understanding. Set the max receive size to 0 for the mailbox(es). That will prevent them from receiving email.

You might try the following. In Exchange Management Console, in the mailbox properties: Select 'Hide from Exchange address lists' On the 'Mailbox Features' tab, disable all the protocols If you don't want any emails received, set the max receive size as described by RussMobile OWA For Smartphone www.leederbyshire.com email a@t leederbyshire d.0.t c.0.m

I disabled the MAPI service on the user account and the user can still send emai!

MAPI is only how that client is able to get mail from the server, same with OutlookAnywhere, OWA, POP3,IMAP. (You would need to check the Outlook connections to see how the client is connecting). Disabling these items will only disallow the user from accessing their mailbox, but will not prevent mail delivery. If you are dead set on 'disabling' those mailboxes without touching the user accounts, why dont you sent the deleted mailbox retention time higher. You can change the deleted mailbox retention time on the database (or individual users) from 0 to 24,885 days. That way you can remove their mailbox and just reconnect them later when you get done with whatever it is you are doing.

So the question is do you want the mailboxes to be able to continue to receive email or not while they are disabled>? If yes, then just disable MAPI/OWA, if you don't then you can maybe use transport rules to drop the email or redirect (if using 2007/2010). Use a DG group and put all the users in there. If using 2003, you can maybe set limits above or just change the SMTP address.Sukh

Hi, Any update?Rowen TechNet Community Support