Receiving and Responding to a Meeting Request

When someone invites you to a meeting or an event, you receive an e-mail message with the meeting request icon next to it. To properly respond to such messages, you should open the message in its own window, rather than using the preview pane, as shown below.

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If you click Accept, Tentative, or Decline, Outlook asks whether you want to send your response and whether you want to add comments to it (if the Office Assistant is turned on, you will see the same message in a balloon):

If the meeting conflicts with something already on your calendar, you'll see a notice to that affect above the sender's name in the message window. In any case, before responding to the invitation, you may want to check your schedule. If you click the Calendar button on the message window's Standard toolbar, a separate calendar window appears with the item shown at the proposed date and time. If there is already something at that time, the two items will appears side by side in the Appointment Pane. In this calendar window, you can review the details of the meeting and any conflicting items to determine how you want to respond. Close the calendar window to return to the meeting request window and click the appropriate button on the Standard toolbar to accept, tentatively accept, decline, or forward the invitation. You can also choose to delete the invitation, which doesn't send back any response.

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