Bulk delete an entry from Outlook auto-fill

[enjay]

Does anyone know of a way of removing a specific name from everyone's auto-fill in Outlook? I know how users can do it individually, but I'd like to do it for everyone. I'm not trying to turn off auto-fill, just to remove a specific person from it.

 

Thanks!

[mullet_man]

I'd love to hear the story of why this one person needs deleting off everyones Outlook haha

 

In practice am not sure you'd be able to delete a specific entry, if you absolutely need this person removing you might be best running this command so it wipes everyone's autofill entities.

 

Outlook.exe /CleanAutoCompleteCache

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/troubleshoot/contacts/information-about-the-outlook-autocomplete-list#how-to-remove-autocomplete-list-entries-one-at-a-time

 

Think you might be able to delete the autocomplete database file too, obviously test it on one device first.

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/import-or-copy-the-auto-complete-list-to-another-computer-83558574-20dc-4c94-a531-25a42ec8e8f0#importnk2

[enjay]

I can't talk about the background of the request just now, but let's just say if they remain in people's auto-fill, we'll get multiple requests to remove them from the address book (which I've already done).

 

Both your links would remove everyone from the auto-fill, which is a bit sledgehammer-y and would generate more tickets than it would solve, due to the number of people who rely on auto-fill rather than saving details as contacts.

[FN-GM]

I'd love to hear the story of why this one person needs deleting off everyones Outlook

 

It's something that is causing us a headache. We have a new starter who before joining worked at another company that works closely with ours. People who corresponded with them in their old position keep emailing their old address, getting bouncebacks and then report faults on the helpdesk.

[Oaktech]

I don't think you can do it per entry, but you can turn off suggestions altogether via group policy, which I think clears everyones, which I did for 3 months and then turned it back on and let the suggestions populate again.

[Oaktech]

It's something that is causing us a headache. We have a new starter who before joining worked at another company that works closely with ours. People who corresponded with them in their old position keep emailing their old address, getting bouncebacks and then report faults on the helpdesk.

 

Transport rule to catch the old address and reply with a verbose message explaining the dumb*ss thing they just did...

 

[FN-GM]

Transport rule to catch the old address and reply with a verbose message explaining the dumb*ss thing they just did...

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]62029[/ATTACH]

 

Don’t be silly! They won’t read it! [emoji23]

[Oaktech]

Don’t be silly! They won’t read it! [emoji23]

 

Perhaps, but I'm given to understand that you can add HTML to that message that might help...

 

THIS THE WRONG ADDRESS DUMB*SS

[robyholmes]

I seem to remember you could hover over auto-fills and press Delete to remove them.

[enjay]

I seem to remember you could hover over auto-fills and press Delete to remove them.

 

You can, but that's individual - I'm looking for a way to remove an address from everyone's auto-fill.

[HPlum78]

There is no good way of doing this... I dont know if you use OWA and the Outlook client app but if you do they store their auto complete entries in different places from memory an all! Also MS added a hidden folder under the contacts part of a users folder The Recipient Cache folder although this still has not had any real documentation released to its use! But is also involved in auto complete. I do not know of a way of removing 1 entry from the cache unfortunately and there are so many places this is pulled from its a difficult one. I am not even sure I want to open PowerShell to start kicking at this stone!

[mullet_man]

I can't talk about the background of the request just now, but let's just say if they remain in people's auto-fill, we'll get multiple requests to remove them from the address book (which I've already done).

 

Both your links would remove everyone from the auto-fill, which is a bit sledgehammer-y and would generate more tickets than it would solve, due to the number of people who rely on auto-fill rather than saving details as contacts.

I guess it depends just how important getting rid of the person is?

 

Another theory, do the autofills stay in sync with name changes? Could you keep the account live and change the name to Joe Bloggs or something? Just a thought not sure if that would work.

[mullet_man]

Actually found this, you might be able to do it after all. Although this is an old script so might not work.

 

http://msweany.blogspot.com/2014/01/office-365-remove-owa-autocomplete.html?view=mosaic&m=1

 

Edit : this might only work on OWA, so looking at this you might need to clear them both in OWA and locally in Outlook?

Edited June 4, 2021 by mullet_man

[mullet_man]

Last one

 

https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/outlook_nk2_edit.html

 

This might work, it says it can be used using command line so you'd need to script it to run for everyone?!

[enjay]

Thanks @mullet_man Those look promising but fiddly so now to decide how much I want to remove this person from everyone's auto-complete!

[mullet_man]

Thanks @mullet_man Those look promising but fiddly so now to decide how much I want to remove this person from everyone's auto-complete!

Yeah sometimes you've got just say is it worth all this time.

 

Could it just be as simple as showing staff how to delete this person from the autocomplete and asking everyone to do it?

[enjay]

Yeah sometimes you've got just say is it worth all this time.

 

Could it just be as simple as showing staff how to delete this person from the autocomplete and asking everyone to do it?

 

On this occasion, I don't think it is worth it! I'll explain more when I can.