When an employee leaves, an inbox can contain much more than messages: open customer questions, supplier decisions, recurring reports, and commitments that have not yet been recorded elsewhere. The goal is not simply to give someone else access. It is to identify work that must continue, assign a person accountable for each item, and preserve only the access and information the business has approved. A written handoff makes those decisions visible and gives the departing employee, manager, and incoming owner a shared way to check that nothing important has been overlooked.
The useful bits
- Review correspondence for active work, recurring duties, and time-sensitive commitments.
- Assign a named owner and next action to every business-critical thread.
- Confirm the handoff through approved access and follow-up checks, not shared passwords.
Start with purpose and permission
Agree who is coordinating the departure handoff: usually the manager or another person authorized by the business. Confirm which mailbox and business records are in scope, who may review them, and how sensitive or personal correspondence should be handled under the organization’s policies. Do not assume that a colleague may inspect every message merely because it is in a work mailbox.
Decide what the incoming owner actually needs. They may need a list of open matters and relevant business records, rather than broad access to the departing person’s entire correspondence. Use the organization’s approved process for access, retention, and any account changes. Do not pass around passwords or one-time codes.
Find the work that still needs an owner
Review recent and older messages with the departing employee where practical. Search by customer, supplier, project, and recurring subject, then check sent mail as well as incoming mail: an unanswered promise may be in a sent message, while a request may be waiting in the inbox. Folders and search can help organize a review, but they do not determine which messages are business-critical.
Look for unresolved questions, promised deliverables, approvals, upcoming renewals or meetings, operational notices, and recurring reports. For each item, capture the context needed to act: who is involved, what was agreed, the next step, any relevant timing, and where the supporting record belongs. Avoid copying unrelated personal material into the handoff.
- Mark an item as active, recurring, informational, or needing a policy decision.
- Record a responsible person and a next action; “the team” is not a clear owner.
- Flag sensitive or ambiguous correspondence for the authorized manager to decide.
Assign responsibility, not just visibility
Name one accountable owner for each continuing relationship or task, and identify a backup if the work cannot wait for that person. The owner should acknowledge the handoff and understand what they are expected to do, rather than merely being copied on a message. Where responsibility is shared, specify who makes decisions and who handles routine replies.
For recurring correspondence, record the trigger and expected action—for example, who reviews a monthly report and where the result is recorded. For customer or supplier matters, note whether the other party should be told about a new contact. Do not send a blanket announcement until the business has approved the wording and recipient list.
Handoff item: Open delivery question Contact: [customer name], [customer@example.com] Current status: [supplier confirmation pending] Next action: [check for confirmation and reply] Owner: [incoming colleague] Timing: [agreed follow-up date] Record location: [approved business location]
Choose an approved access path
Ask the organization’s authorized administrator what access or mailbox options are available for this account and suitable under its policies. Do not assume that a mailbox can be transferred, recovered, delegated, or accessed in a particular way. Availability may depend on role, plan, and provisioning state. Keep the handoff plan separate from any technical change until the responsible administrator confirms what is supported.
If the organization uses BITTU Mail, workspace administration is for authorized workspace or domain administrators, and available controls can depend on role, plan, and provisioning state. The handoff should still identify business responsibilities independently of any particular mailbox feature. Never treat an alias as an independent mailbox or login without confirmation.
Confirm the handoff in ordinary work
Before the departure is complete, review the handoff with the incoming owner. Have them confirm they can locate the approved business records, understand each assigned next step, and know how to raise an access problem with the authorized administrator. Where appropriate, ask them to acknowledge a test or current business message through the approved process; do not use sensitive customer information for a test.
After the transition, check the specific responsibilities on the agreed follow-up schedule. Confirm that open matters have progressed, recurring messages have a reviewer, and senders know the right contact where that change was approved. A successful login alone does not prove that commitments were understood or that every important thread was identified.
Close out with a record of decisions
Keep a concise handoff record in an approved business location: the items reviewed, owners assigned, unresolved decisions, and who approved any access change. Note what was intentionally excluded or deferred, without retaining unnecessary message content. This gives the manager a way to distinguish a completed handoff from work that still needs attention.
If the review uncovers a high-impact commitment with no clear owner, pause and escalate it to the responsible manager rather than guessing. Revisit the list if new information arrives before the departure. A careful process cannot guarantee that every relevant message will be found, but clear ownership and documented follow-up make missed work easier to spot and address.
About this guide
Prepared with AI assistance for the BITTU Mail editorial library. Check important details against your original messages and current account settings. Product access depends on your role, plan and provisioning state. Provider interfaces and requirements can change.
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