Introduction to Outlook 2007: Managing Multiple Email Accounts

Outlook 2007 can manage all your email accounts for you, becoming one central place to work with all your messages. It does, however, add some complexity in that you need to know which account any given message came in on or will be sent out on. The rest of this article explains how you do this.

When you Receive Messages

Let's talk about how Outlook receives and manages messages from more than one account at a time. Outlook will automatically check each email account (the settings in your Send/Receive groups determine when). Messages from most types of email accounts end up in the Inbox, while messages from HTTP mail accounts, like Hotmail, end up in their own collection of mail folders.

Wondering how you will know which messages are associated with which accounts? It turns out that's easy. The Hotmail messages end up in their own set of folders. For the others, if you can't tell simple by whom they're from, you can look at the To: field of the message. The email address the sender addressed it to appear here.

Except when it doesn't. Sometimes you'll see a nickname instead of the email address in the To: field. If there's a nickname, following these steps will show you the actual email address associated with that nickname:

1. Right-click the nickname.
2. In the shortcut menu, click Outlook Properties.
3. In the dialog box, look on the E-mail Addresses tabbed page. This will tell you which address the message were sent to.

Sending Messages from Multiple Accounts

When you are sending messages, you're in control of which account Outlook uses. Outlook always has a default account for sending messages (usually the first account you set up), but you can tell Outlook to use a different account. Here's how it works:

• When you create a new message, Outlook assumes you'll want to use the default account to send it (I'll tell you how to change the default account in a few minutes) unless you specific a different account.

• If you are replying to a message, Outlook uses the account that the message came in on. In other words, if you receive a message sent to your account named xyz@mymailserver.com, and you clicked Reply or Reply to All, Outlook would assume you want to send the reply using the xyz@mymailserver.com account. Unless, of course, you tell Outlook to use a different account.

• When you forward a message, Outlook will assume you want to do so using the same account as the original message.

The way Outlook selects the account to use makes great sense, but what if you don't want to use the account Outlook thinks you want to use? How do you tell Outlook to use a different account? That's easy.

You tell Outlook which email account to use when you have the message window open. When you have multiple accounts set up, you will see an Account button below the Send button. Click the Account button, and Outlook will display a menu containing all your e-mail accounts. Select one, and Outlook uses that one to send your message.

Changing the Default Account

You may sometimes decide that you want Outlook to use a different email account as your default. If you want to change the default, follow these steps:

• Go to the main Outlook menu and click Tools > Account Settings to open the Account Settings dialog box.

• On the E-mail tabbed page of the Account Settings dialog box, find the box listing all your email accounts. Click the account you want to make your new default account.

• In the space above the account list, find and click Set as Default. Outlook dims this option until you select a new account to use as the default.

• The list rearranges itself so the new default option appears at the top of the list.

• Click Close.

With this information, you are ready to manage your multiple email accounts.