How to unsend an email sent by mistake?

There are dozens of situations in a company when a wrong email goes to a customer - wrong recipient, missing attachments, incorrect data. There can be many reasons for sending such an email - fatigue, haste, or simply an accident. Regardless of how many there are, they can cause you serious trouble.

How do you get out of such situations? And are there features that can help prevent a disaster? Fortunately, yes.

There are systems like Sugester - an easy-to-use CRM and helpdesk system that, in addition to standard email features, also offers the option to cancel email sending, which you can use whenever you need it. Thanks to it, your email might never see the light of day - as long as you react in time.

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Let's first look at how popular email services handle unsending emails.

Cancelling email sending in Gmail

If you use Gmail - great news! You can enable the unsend feature in settings. How does it work? Gmail simply delays sending the email, so you can still cancel it for a moment after clicking "send". You have up to 30 seconds, if you set it that way in Gmail settings.

Here's what Gmail says about this feature:

If you decide that sending an email was premature, for a short while after sending it you can still cancel it. Here's how:

1. A "Message sent" notification will appear in the lower left corner with "Undo" and "View message" options.
2. Click Undo

To set how long you have to cancel sending:

1. Open Gmail on your computer.
2. In the top right corner, click Settings -> See all settings.
3. Next to "Undo Send", select 5, 10, 20, or 30 seconds.

Unsending email in Outlook

In outlook.com, like in Gmail, you can delay sending a message by 5 or 10 seconds.

As Microsoft support writes on their website, the unsend option can be enabled as follows:

1. At the top of the page, select Settings -> View all Outlook settings
2. Select Mail -> Compose and reply
3. Under "Undo Send", select how long Outlook.com will wait before sending the message
4. Select "Save".

Once you've configured the undo send feature, an "Undo send" prompt will appear at the bottom of the message list each time you send a new message. The prompt will be available for the time set in the "Compose and reply" window.

In Outlook for Windows, there's also an option to recall a message, which means retrieving the sent message from recipients' mailboxes. However, there's one important condition - this only applies to messages that have not been opened by the recipient. Additionally, the message recall feature is only available when both the sender and recipient have a Microsoft 365 or Microsoft Exchange email account in the same organization. You cannot, for example, recall a message sent to or from a Hotmail, Gmail, or live.com account.

To recall a message in Outlook for Windows:

1. On the "Message" tab, select Actions > Recall This Message.
2. Go to the folder pane on the left side of the Outlook window and select the "Sent Items" folder.
3. Open the message you want to recall. Double-click to open the message. Selecting the message to display it in the reading pane does not allow you to recall it.

How to unsend an email in webmail services?

There are email services that don't have an unsend option. If you make a mistake and send an incorrect message there, unfortunately you'll have to deal with the consequences.

Similarly, many webmail providers don't offer the ability to unsend an email. The only option available with such providers is deleting the email from the "Sent" folder, but this won't protect you from the sent email reaching the recipient.

How to protect yourself from sending unwanted emails?

Regardless of which email provider you use, you can have an unsend service. All you need is the right email management system.

Sugester is - as we've already mentioned - a CRM and helpdesk system. One of its modules is the email module. In addition to standard email features, Sugester - on every plan - also offers the option to cancel email sending, which you can use whenever you need it.

Will the recipient really not receive the message?

Sugester has a "Cancel sending" feature. Thanks to it, the system can delay sending the email long enough for the sender to click the "Cancel" button if needed. What matters is the result - that the recipient ultimately won't receive the message. We delay sending by 5 seconds, and that's really long enough to react.

How to activate the "Cancel sending" feature in Sugester?

Keep in mind that when you enable this feature on the account, you activate it for all email inboxes and all users. If you want to make your employees and yourself happy, click Settings -> Email configuration.

In the "Email and ticket handling" section, at the bottom of the page you'll find the "Cancel sending" checkbox. Check it and Save changes. Done!

How to unsend an email in Sugester?

Nothing simpler. Every time right after you click the "Send" button in the email composition window in Sugester, you'll see a small blue button "Email sent - Cancel".