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J-J-G

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How to clear Office 365 Exchange Account Purges Folder

I am looking to perform a clean up on a user account as a transfer tool also recognised the purges folder (once items have been deleted from the 'Recover Deleted Items Folder').

What is the best way to clean up the ‘Purges’ folder of an Office 365 account without impacting the active mailbox? At the moment, I can see the data is still in there and am unable to wait until Office 365 clears it out.

From what research I have done, I can do it via PowerShell however am not sure on the best method.
Avatar of Adam Brown
Adam Brown
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You can't clear it out without waiting for O365 to do its thing. Not even admins can delete emails that fall under retention policies or inplace/legal hold. There's a retention policy that governs the purges folder that you will need to modify. Go to the retention tags and modify the deleted items folder retention period to drop it down to 1-2 days, then wait for them to clear. 

Purges is considered part of the "active" mailbox, so be careful what you do there. In case you are 100% sure you want to empty it, follow the steps here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/security-and-compliance/recoverable-items-folder/clean-up-deleted-items
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