Tip 476: Meeting Requests: Pick From Several Dates

A frequent request in the Microsoft newsgroups is from users looking for a way to send out meeting requests for training sessions or benefits meetings with HR, where each employee can pick the session that fits their schedule.  The selected meeting date needs to be added to the recipients calendar and the senders copy needs to have a list of the attendees.

Unfortunately Outlook doesn’t  have the capability for creating this type of meeting request, but you can do nearly the same thing by creating the meetings in the calendar, then save each meeting as an ICS file on the hard drive.  Send the invitees a message with each of the ICS files attached and instructions to choose the meeting they want to attend.

1. Create the meeting invitations and invite yourself and click Send.
2. Open each item on your calendar select File, Save as.
3. Save each item as an ICs on the hard drive.
4. Create the email message and attach the ICS files.
5. When the recipients accept the meeting request, they’ll send a response and the meeting is added to their calendar.
6. The sender’s copy will update with the recipient’s name as an optional attendee.

To avoid confusion, use the meeting date in the subject so the recipient only has to open the meeting they plan to attend. 

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This article is filed under Tips Archive.
Last reviewed on Jun 17, 2011