How to Schedule Emails and Send Them at The Best Time

Microsoft Outlook Delayed Delivery

There are several instances where one may need to schedule an email, rather than send it immediately. Most people time their email to:

• Send emails at the most appropriate time for clients, business partners, or investors
• Address the communication troubles when dealing with clients from different time zones
• Reply at their own convenient time
• Show thoughtfulness by scheduling recurring emails

The good news is, Microsoft Outlook simplifies email scheduling for your business with the delayed delivery feature. Outlook can save you the trouble of trying to remember to reply to messages later while giving you the ability to respond at your preferred time but send the message later.

How To Delay Email Delivery on Microsoft Outlook

You can readily delay the delivery of an individual message or set up a rule to delay all emails by having them held in the Outbox for a specific time after clicking the Send button on Microsoft Outlook. However, the delayed delivery feature is only available for Outlook for Windows and unavailable for the web version.

Here’s a step by step procedure to delay email delivery on Outlook:

1. Open Outlook for Windows and click New Email at the top left of the screen. Alternatively, you can select Reply or Reply All when replying to an email or the Forward option If you’re forwarding an email
2. On the message window, address and compose your email
3. While writing your message, click on the Options tab at the top of the window
4. On the tray that opens below, choose Delay Delivery
5. Check the Do not deliver Before option
6. Set the date and time you want your message to deliver
7. Hit the Close button at the bottom of the window
8. Finish composing the rest of your email, and click the Send button

On hitting the Send button, your email will appear on the Outbox folder until the time you selected to send.

If, for any reason, you later decide to send the email immediately — instead of delaying it until the time you had initially specified — here’s the quick step-by-step procedure to follow.

1. Head over to the Outbox folder
2. Open the delayed email
3. Navigate to Options at the top of the window. A tray will open below
4. Select Delivery options
5. Uncheck the Do not deliver before box
6. Hit the Close button at the bottom
7. Click the Send option to deliver your email immediately

How to Delay Delivery of All Messages

Sometimes you might want to set a default delay for all your emails to prevent your messages from being delivered immediately. Default delay allows time to make changes or cancel them within the delay time if you’d regret sending them hastily.

Outlook allows your business to delay all your messages by creating a rule of up to two hours. Here’s a step-by-step procedure to set delay delivery for all emails:

1. Head over to the File tab
2. Select Info
3. Click on the Rules and Alert option
4. On the windows that open, select the Manage Rules and Alerts option
5. A small window will open, find the Email Rules tab and select the New Rule to open the Rules Wizard
6. Navigate through the Rules Wizard to find the Start from a blank rule section
7. Choose the Apply rule on messages I send option
8. Hit the Next option to open another small window
9. On the new Select condition(s) window, find an option you want to apply to sent messages. Clear all the checkboxes if you want to delay the email delivery of all emails
10. Hit the Next button at the bottom right
11. A confirmation box will pop up. Click on Yes to apply the rule to all messages you send
12. A Select action(s) list will appear. Check the “defer delivery by a number of minutes” box to open another box
13. Choose “a number of” in the Edit the rule description to open a new dialog box
14. Key in the number of minutes you’d want to delay your emails before sending them in the Deferred Delivery dialog box. Outlook allows up to 120 minutes
15. Click OK.
16. In the Rules Wizard, select Next
17. Select any exceptions in the window that opens, and hit the Next button to open a text box
18. Key in a descriptive name on the Specify a name for this rule text box to separate emails whose delivery shouldn’t delay
19. Activate the rule by checking the Turn on this rule checkbox
20. Then, hit the Finish tab
21. Select OK in the Rules and Alerts dialog box to apply the changes

After finishing the process, hitting the Send button for any email will move it to the Outbox or Draft folder — waiting for your scheduled time to deliver to your recipient.

Two Factors that Might Limit The Delay Delivery Function of Outlook

After setting your Outlook delayed delivery, you should expect email delivery at the time you specify. However, some instances might hinder the functionality of the delayed delivery feature.

Two of the instances include:

• Outlook is not running at the email delivery time
• Lack of internet connection during the delivery time

What Happens When It’s Delivery Time, and Outlook Isn’t Running?

When the delivery time of your scheduled email arrives and Outlook isn’t running, your recipient won’t receive the email. However, Outlook will deliver your email immediately the next time you run the software.

What Happens When You Lack Internet Connection During the Delivery Time

When the delivery time of your delayed email comes but you lack internet — but your Outlook is running — the software will try to send the email at the time you specified, but it’ll fail.

Outlook will show you a Send/Receive Progress error to tell you that the email can’t be delivered. When you restore your internet connection, Outlook will attempt to send the email again, but at a later time.

Suppose you set your Microsoft Outlook to work in offline mode — during the scheduled delivery time — the application will automatically deliver your email as soon as your account is working online again.

Palindrome Consulting Helps Businesses in South Florida With All Their Microsoft Outlook Needs

Microsoft Outlook is more than a communication tool in the corporate world. However, to leverage its full capabilities, you need to understand some of its hidden features for your business benefit.

At Palindrome Consulting, we can help your business get the most out of outlook. Contact us today to learn more about how your business can drive the productivity and efficiency of your communication.