How to Request Required Attendees Only to Respond to Your Meeting Invitation in Outlook

Some users desire to only request meeting responses from the required attendees when sending an Outlook meeting invitation. This article will teach how to realize it via Outlook VBA.

To not request responses when sending meeting invitations, you can just click the “Response Options” button and uncheck the “Request Responses” option. But, by this means, all the attendees, no matter required or optional, will not be required to send their meeting responses. However, in reality, most of time, what you wish is to not request responses from optional attendees. In this case, you have to seek other methods, such as the following one.

Request Required Attendees Only to Respond to Your Meeting Invitation

1. In the first place, launch your Outlook application.
2. Then press “Alt + F11” key buttons in the main Outlook screen.
3. Next, after getting access to Outlook VBA editor, you ought to find and open the “ThisOutlookSession” project.
4. Subsequently, copy the following VBA code into this project window.

Private Sub Application_ItemSend(ByVal Item As Object, Cancel As Boolean)
    Dim objMeeting As Outlook.MeetingItem
    Dim objCopiedMeeting As Outlook.AppointmentItem
    Dim objOriginalAttendee As Outlook.recipient
    Dim objCopiedAttendee As Outlook.recipient
 
    If TypeOf Item Is MeetingItem Then
       Set objMeeting = Item
 
       For i = objMeeting.Recipients.count To 1 Step -1
           'Remove Optional Attendees from the Original Meeting Invitation
           Set objOriginalAttendee = objMeeting.Recipients.Item(i)
           If objOriginalAttendee.Type = olOptional Then
              objOriginalAttendee.Delete
           End If
       Next
 
      'Copy the Meeting
      Set objCopiedMeeting = objMeeting.GetAssociatedAppointment(True).Copy
      'Disable "Request Response" Feature in the Copied Meeting
      objCopiedMeeting.ResponseRequested = False
 
      For i = objCopiedMeeting.Recipients.count To 1 Step -1
          'Add the Previously Removed Optional Attendees
          Set objCopiedAttendee = objCopiedMeeting.Recipients.Item(i)
          If objCopiedAttendee.Type = olRequired Then
             objCopiedAttendee.Delete
          End If
      Next
 
      'Send out the Copied Meeting
      objCopiedMeeting.Send
      'Delete the Copied Meeting after Sending
      objCopiedMeeting.Delete
    End If
End Sub

5. After that, you should sign this VBA project.

• Stay in the current macro and hit “Tools” in the toolbar.
• Then choose “Digital Signatures” option.
• In the popup dialog box, follow the onscreen instructions to complete it.

6. Later check your Outlook macro settings to insure that digitally signed macro is enabled.
7. From now on, when you send out a meeting invitation, the optional attendees won’t be required to respond. From their perspectives, the meeting invitation will look like the following screenshot:

Combat Viruses and Malware in Outlook

Outlook Junk Email filter plays an important role in avoiding unexpected virus and malware attacks. Nowadays, viruses become increasingly sophisticated. So as to block virus infection and malware assault, not only should you block spams in time, but also you had better report the suspicious email domains or addresses to Microsoft, helping to strengthen Outlook Junk Email filter. In addition, aside from the inbuilt junk email filter, you need to also keep a formidable repair tool, such as DataNumen Outlook Repair. It has a much higher Outlook recovery rate than its rivals.

Author Introduction:

Shirley Zhang is a data recovery expert in DataNumen, Inc., which is the world leader in data recovery technologies, including recover sql and outlook repair software products. For more information visit www.datanumen.com