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Clean Up Your UMail Account

When your UMail account is exceeds its quota, you will not be able to receive any email until you have deleted or downloaded messages to free up space on your account. UMass Amherst students receive a 30 MB account, and faculty and staff are allocated 500 MB of space.

Note: These pages describe clean-up options for UMail on the Web. You can use these procedures even if you are using an email client (e.g., Mozilla Thunderbird) to access UMail. Simply log in to UMail on the Web at http://umail.oit.umass.edu.

Delete & Purge Messages

In UMail on the Web, messages that are marked to be deleted still occupy space in your account. Follow these instructions to erase deleted messages from your account:

Note:

  • You cannot purge deleted messages from individual folders if your Trash folder is enabled. (Your Trash is active if an Empty Trash icon appears in the Mailbox Menu.) For more information, see Disable Your Trash Folder below.
  • When you purge your deleted messages, these messages are erased permanently. Make sure that you do not delete messages that you need to keep for future use!

  1. In UMail on the Web, in your Inbox or any other folder where you want to delete messages, select the box next to each message you would like to delete.
  2. Click Delete (top left). The messages you selected will be marked for deletion. Note: In UMail on the Web, deleted messages appear with a dark gray shade and a line (strikethrough) over the text. If you cannot see deleted messages in your UMail folders, click Show Deleted (top right).
  3. Click Purge Deleted (top right) to permanently erase deleted messages.

Manage Your Trash Folder

If you have a Trash folder in UMail on the Web, messages will be moved to this folder when you delete them. Deleted messages are permanently removed only when you empty your Trash.

We recommend that you disable your Trash folder because:

  • Trash folders typically take up a lot of space, especially if not emptied on a regular basis.
  • If your account goes over quota, you will need to empty your Trash before you can delete any messages.

Disable Your Trash Folder

  1. In the Mailbox Menu (the icons at the top of the UMail on the Web screen), click Options. The User Options screen will open.
  2. On the User Options screen, under Mail Management, click Deleting and Moving Messages. The Deleting and Moving Messages screen will open.
  3. On the Deleting and Moving Messages screen, clear the box next to When deleting messages, move them to your Trash folder instead of marking them as deleted?, then click Save Options. You will return to the User Options screen; the Empty Trash icon will no longer appear in the Mailbox Menu.

Empty Your Trash Folder

You can empty your trash manually (simply click the Empty Trash icon in the Mailbox Menu) or set it to purge automatically. To set how often your Trash folder is emptied:

  1. In the Mailbox Menu (the icons at the top of the UMail on the Web screen), click Options. The User Options screen will open.
  2. On the User Options screen, click Maintenance Operations. The Maintenance Operations screen will open.
  3. On the Maintenance Operations screen, from the Purge Trash How Often: drop-down menu, select how frequently your trash folder is emptied (e.g., Monthly), or enter a specific number of days in the Purge messages in Trash folder older than this amount of days field.
  4. Click Save Options. You will return to the User Options screen.

For more information on setting UMail options, visit the Set Options page.

Empty Your Sent Folder

If you use UMail on the Web, sent messages can take up a substantial amount of space on your account. We recommend that you only save important outgoing messages (do not set UMail to save all sent mail). At the very least, you should purge your Sent folder on a regular basis.

Note: Only messages composed with UMail on the Web are stored in your Sent folder. Messages composed through email clients (e.g., MS Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird, Apple Mail) will most likely be stored by the client on your computer.

To disable saving all sent mail:

  1. In the Mailbox Menu, click Options. The User Options screen will open.
  2. On the User Options screen, under Your Information, click Personal Information, then Edit your identities. The Identities screen will open.
  3. On the Identities screen, clear the box next to Save sent mail, then click Change. A confirmation message will appear at the top of the screen.

To set how often UMail deletes your sent messages:

  1. In the Mailbox Menu, click Options. The User Options screen will open.
  2. On the User Options screen, click Maintenance Operations. The Maintenance Operations screen will open.
  3. On the Maintenance Operations screen:
    • Select the box next to Rename sent-mail folder at beginning of month? to have UMail change the name of your sent folder at the beginning of every month for easy management of your sent messages.
    • Select the box next to Delete old sent-mail folders at beginning of month? to automatically delete sent message folders.
    • In the field next to Number of old sent-mail folders to keep if deleting monthly, enter the amount of months (folders) that you want UMail to keep on file. For example, if you enter 6, UMail will keep sent-message folders going back 6 months, and delete older ones.
    • Click Save Options. You will return to the User Options screen.

For more information on setting your Sent folder options, visit the Set Options page.

Clean Up Your Spam Folder

By default, UMail is set to delete messages filtered to your Spam folder every 14 days. Check your Spam folder frequently since there could be messages consuming valuable space. We recommend that you set up your spam folder to be emptied more often than 14 days, especially if you get a lot of spam.

  1. Log in to the UMail Post Office with your OIT Account NetID and password.
  2. On the Main Lobby screen, click Spam Filtering. The Spam Filtering screen will open.
  3. On the Spam Filtering screen, under 2. Automatically delete old spam after how long?, select the radio button next to the number of days after which you would like spam messages to be deleted from your account. We recommend that you select 1 or 3 days.
  4. Once you set your options, click Submit Changes. A confirmation message will appear in red at the top of the screen.
  5. Click Logout (top right) to exit the UMail Post Office.

Related Pages

Need Help?

If you encounter problems, submit an online Help Request.
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Contact the OIT Help Desk at 545-9400.

Last revised August 06, 2009