Leaving UW Exchange Local (without leaving skid marks)

Your UW Exchange Local account (mail and calendar, etc.) is provided through your department. The department pays a small monthly fee to maintain each account, and will want to delete your account as soon as possible after you leave the department.

Moving to another UW Department?

Many UW departments use UW Exchange Local, but not all. You should ask the computing support team in your new department (ask your new manager) if "UW Exchange Local" is used in your new department. If so, let your new computing support folks know that you already have a UW Exchange Local account, but they should move support and charges for that account to your new department. This will prevent your old department from deleting the account and you can continue to use it without interruption.

If your new department does not use UW Exchange Local, you will have to discontinue use of the UW Exchange Local service. Ask the computing support team in your new department if there is a departmental preference on which email service you should be using.

Leaving the UW, including retirement?

Your UW email address (Your_UWNetID@uw.edu) is yours "forever". You can set up forwarding so mail sent to that address is delivered wherever you wish. If you officially retire, you may be eligible for a UW email service, other than UW Exchange. If you are separating from the UW, you may get an email account with your new employer, or choose to open an account privately.

You will want to take steps to exit UW Exchange before your last day with your current department. Some of these steps may take several days to finish, especially where you rely on others to take some actions. Your local/departmental computing support team should be able to provide assistance if needed.

To gracefully exit UW Exchange you should:

  1. Set @u forwarding to send new mail to your new mail service, or stop all delivery, using the page at:
    https://uwnetid.washington.edu/manage/?forward

    Note that email sent to your UW Email address from outside of UW Exchange will now go to the mailbox you've named, but mail from other UW Exchange users will still be going to your UW Exchange Inbox.

  2. Put an "out of office" message in place in UW Exchange using "OWA" at:
    https://exchange.washington.edu/owa

    Note the "out of office" message will be delivered only to people that actually get a message delivered to your UW Exchange mailbox.

  3. Decline your participation in any meetings scheduled using UW Exchange that occur after your departure.

  4. Cancel any meetings for which you are the organizer that occur in the future, you may wish to arrange for someone else to act as organizer and re-schedule them.

  5. Collect information that needs to be preserved in the department after your departure (e.g., project notes or correspondance that isn't preserved elsewhere) into a folder. Grant access to that folder to the person taking responsibility in future (and/or your manager). Let them know they should copy that material to somewhere else outside of your UW Exchange account, get confirmation this has been done.

  6. Copy information you wish to preserve to your new email service. Details depend somewhat on what email service you will be using in future and what email software you have available on the computer(s) you'll be using.

    This process can be greatly simplified if you have a copy of Microsoft Outlook available on the computer(s) you'll be using. It then becomes:


  7. Inform your local computing support team that you are done with your UW Exchange account and it may be deleted (they will submit the delete request, you will probably get a message asking for you to confirm the deletion).