Why isn't my recently changed Exchange Online Archive policy not being applied?

Adam Bohil 41

Hello,

I am new to Exchange Online in general and very new to Online Archiving.

When we implement Exchange Online Archive for our users, we typically apply the default archive policy of 2 years. While the process can sometimes be slow to start, we haven't encountered any significant issues. However, there is one user for whom we applied the default 2-year archive policy to the mailbox, and additionally, we applied the "Personal 1-Year Move to Archive" policy specifically to the "Deleted Items" folder. We did this because the Deleted Items folder consumes more than half of the user's mailbox storage space.

The problem is that the 1-year archive policy isn't being applied to that folder. Instead, the 2-year policy is being enforced.

It’s been over a week since the 1-year policy was applied to that folder. Shouldn’t items older than one year be archived by now? Or am I misunderstanding how this process works?

Thanks for any assistance you can provide!

-Adam

1 answer

Vasil Michev 113.5K Reputation points MVP

2025-02-12T17:05:42.7933333+00:00

Two things. First, "personal" tags do not automatically apply to any folder. Think of them as optional tags that you publish, so that users have a choice to apply some different retention settings to a folder. In other words, to have a "working" personal tag, the user must assign it to items/folders.

Second, the Deleted items folder is a bit special. Microsoft decided a while back to treat it differently, as apparently it deleting items automatically caused too many support calls. It should only apply to tags with "delete" action, but I though I'd mention it here just in case.
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Adam Bohil 41 Reputation points

2025-02-12T19:12:25.9266667+00:00

Thank you so much for the quick response!

I believe the description you gave in the first part of your answer is my current understanding. When I said, "we applied the 'Personal 1-Year Move to Archive' policy specifically to the Deleted Items folder", I was referring to this:

Am I still overlooking anything there?

As for the second part, I'm not sure I follow. Would the way in which MS treats the Deleted Items folder differently prevent the assigned policy from applying to it? Like I said, it's been more than a week since the policy was applied to that folder, so I'm perplexed as to why it hasn't been applied yet.

I appreciate your taking the time to help myself and others with these questions (and, for your patience!).

Thanks!

-Adam

Vasil Michev 113.5K Reputation points MVP

2025-02-12T20:23:10.52+00:00

No, that looks OK. It can take a while for the initial processing, and the background process responsible for this runs on a weekly cadence in Exchange Online, so it might just be regular delay. Give it a push or two via Start-ManagedFolderAssistant.

For the Deleted items folder, I was referring to this: https://www.michev.info/blog/post/5868/make-sure-deleted-items-are-automatically-removed-from-microsoft-365-mailboxes

Afaik, it should not affect tags with Archive action, but things might have changed.

Are you seeing items in other folders being moved to the archive?

Adam Bohil 41 Reputation points

2025-02-12T20:55:30.07+00:00

I'm glad you mentioned it -- I have invoked Start-ManagedFolderAssistant on that mailbox twice since setting the policy -- once at about 3 days after and once at around 5 or 6 days after. I will do it again this afternoon.

Yes, we are seeing items from all folders (including Deleted Items) that are older than two years get moved over to the online archive regularly as expected.

One thing I was curious about: The user has completely run out of storage space and been prevented from sending and receiving a couple times. To get her up-and-running, I cleared storage space by manually moving Deleted Items from the main mailbox to the archive. Do you think that could be contributing to the delay (not that it matters).

Thanks!

Vasil Michev 113.5K Reputation points MVP

2025-02-13T06:45:42.1133333+00:00

Mailbox being full should not affect this, as it's a "move to archive" tag. If the archive is also at its quota, you'll have to enable auto-expanding archives, or delete items instead.

You can get some information on the mailbox processing via the mailbox diagnostic logs, see this article for details: https://practical365.com/understanding-the-exchange-managed-folder-assistant/
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Why isn't my recently changed Exchange Online Archive policy not being applied?

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