Verifying the Account Outlook is Sending Through

I met Roger Guess (@RogerGuess) on Twitter this morning when I responded to one of his tweets. Roger’s tweet asked if there was some way in Outlook to have a visual reminder of the account an item is being sent through. Roger explained that he needs this to avoid sending message through the wrong account.

Outlook does provide a visual cue in the form of a warning that appears directly above the Send button for any message that’s not being sent through the default e-mail account. The warning says “This message will be sent via .” Since this warning does not appear for messages being sent via the default account it does act as a warning. If the warning does not appear, then you’re sending through the default account. If it does appear, then you know you’re sending through one of your other accounts and the warning tells you which one you’re using.

I explained this to Roger who replied that he needs a more obvious warning. The solution I propose is to use a small script to display a pop-up dialog-box asking Roger to verify the account to send through. This script will be triggered each time Roger sends an item. For each outbound item a dialog-box with the prompt “Are you sure you want to send the message through the account?” will appear. If Roger clicks the Yes button, then the message will send via the selected account. If instead Roger clicks “No”, then the code will cancel the send giving Roger the opportunity to select a different account for it go out under.

Instructions.

Outlook 2007.

1. Start Outlook
2. Press ALT+F11 to open the Visual Basic Editor
3. If not already expanded, expand Microsoft Office Outlook Objects and click on ThisOutlookSession
4. Copy the code from the Code Snippet box and paste it into the right-hand pane of Outlook’s VB Editor window
5. Edit the code as needed. I included comment lines wherever something needs to or can change
6. Click the diskette icon on the toolbar to save the changes
7. Close the VB Editor
8. Click File and select Options
9. When the Outlook Options dialog appears click Trust Center then click the Trust Center Settings button
10. Click Macro Settings
11. Select either of the two bottom settings (i.e. “Notifications for all macros” or “Enable all macros (not recommended; potentially dangerous code can run)”. The choice of which to chose is up to you. If you select “Notifications”, then you’ll be prompted at times to enable macros. If you pick “Enable all” then there’s a chance that a malicious macro could run. It’s a question of how much risk you want to assume.
12. Click Ok until the dialog-boxes have all closed
13. Close Outlook
14. Start Outlook. Outlook will display a dialog-box warning that ThisOutlookSession contains macros and asking if you want to allow them to run. Say yes.

Outlook 2010.

1. Start Outlook
2. Click Tools > Macro > Visual Basic Editor
3. If not already expanded, expand Microsoft Office Outlook Objects and click on ThisOutlookSession
4. Copy the code from the Code Snippet box and paste it into the right-hand pane of Outlook’s VB Editor window
5. Edit the code as needed. I included comment lines wherever something needs to or can change
6. Click the diskette icon on the toolbar to save the changes
7. Close the VB Editor
8. Click File and select Options
9. When the Outlook Options dialog appears click Trust Center then click the Trust Center Settings button
10. Click Macro Settings
11. Select either of the two bottom settings (i.e. “Notifications for all macros” or “Enable all macros (not recommended; potentially dangerous code can run)”. The choice of which to chose is up to you. If you select “Notifications”, then you’ll be prompted at times to enable macros. If you pick “Enable all” then there’s a chance that a malicious macro could run. It’s a question of how much risk you want to assume.
12. Click Ok until the dialog-boxes have all closed
13. Close Outlook
14. Start Outlook. Outlook will display a dialog-box warning that ThisOutlookSession contains macros and asking if you want to allow them to run. Say yes.

Private Sub Application_ItemSend(ByVal Item As Object, Cancel As Boolean)
    Dim olkPA As Outlook.PropertyAccessor, strAccount As String, intPos1 As Integer, intPos2 As Integer
    If Item.Class = olMail Then
        If msgbox("Are you sure you want to send the message through the " & Item.SendUsingAccount & " account?", vbYesNo + vbApplicationModal, "Verify Sending Account") = vbNo Then
            Cancel = True
        End If
    Else
        Set olkPA = Item.PropertyAccessor
        strAccount = olkPA.GetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x0E28001E")
        intPos1 = InStr(1, strAccount, Chr(1))
        intPos2 = InStr(intPos1 + 1, strAccount, Chr(1))
        strAccount = Mid(strAccount, intPos1 + 1, intPos2 - (intPos1 + 1))
        If msgbox("Are you sure you want to send this item through the " & strAccount & " account?", vbYesNo + vbApplicationModal, "Verify Sending Account") = vbNo Then
            Cancel = True
        End If
        Set olkPA = Nothing
    End If
End Sub

Notes.

• This solution is only for Outlook 2007 and later. Outlook’s object model for 2003 and earlier did not have the SendUsingAccount property.
• I modified the code on 1/30/2012 to handle items other than emails (e.g. meeting requests). Unfortunately, they don’t have a SendUsingAccount property, so I had to improvise. My solution is to use the PropertyAccessor object to read a property directly from the MAPI object. It appears to work, but as with all improvised solutions it may be subject to problems.

Revisions.

• Revision 1

This revision is for Hugh who asked if it’s possible to be prompted to verify the account only when an item is not being sent through the default account. The answer is “yes”. All we need to do is alter the logic a bit to compare the account an item is being sent through to the default account. If the two don’t match, then display the verification dialog-box. The code does nothing for items sent through the default account.

All Hugh needs to do is use this code instead of the code in the original post. The same instructions apply. As with the original post, this solution only works for Outlook 2007 and later.

Private Sub Application_ItemSend(ByVal Item As Object, Cancel As Boolean)
    Dim olkPA As Outlook.PropertyAccessor, strAccount As String, intPos1 As Integer, intPos2 As Integer
    If Item.Class = olMail Then
        If Item.SendUsingAccount <> Session.CurrentUser.Address Then
            If MsgBox("Are you sure you want to send the message through the " & Item.SendUsingAccount & " account?", vbYesNo + vbApplicationModal, "Verify Sending Account") = vbNo Then
                Cancel = True
            End If
        End If
    Else
        Set olkPA = Item.PropertyAccessor
        strAccount = olkPA.GetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x0E28001E")
        intPos1 = InStr(1, strAccount, Chr(1))
        intPos2 = InStr(intPos1 + 1, strAccount, Chr(1))
        strAccount = Mid(strAccount, intPos1 + 1, intPos2 - (intPos1 + 1))
        If strAccount <> Session.CurrentUser.Address Then
            If MsgBox("Are you sure you want to send this item through the " & strAccount & " account?", vbYesNo + vbApplicationModal, "Verify Sending Account") = vbNo Then
                Cancel = True
            End If
        End If
        Set olkPA = Nothing
    End If
End Sub