Forum Discussion
Delete channel permanently, no ability to restore
I really truly want to delete a Teams channel. It had sensitive information and I unwittingly created the channel in the all company team.
I deleted it, and went to the team in Sharepoint and deleted the corresponding items in the Documents section. Subsequently deleted those from the recycle bin.
It looks like I'm in the clear, but when I go to the team, Manage Team, Channels, it still shows up under Deleted with the ability to Restore. I will never want to restore this and I want to remove any chance of that ever happening.
Additionally, I am an administrator. When I go to Teams Administration Center, Groups, Channels, it does not appear, nor can I locate a "deleted" area where it might be restored. Note I work for a small company and am not an experienced administrator.
Microsoft Teams Version 1.3.00.18164. It was last updated on 7/26/20.
- ThereseSolimeno
Microsoft
Hello cshortldi There is a similar post on our answers.microsoft.com tech support site that may provide you with a solution (take a look at the reply on 12/20/19: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/all/unable-to-delete-channel-permanently-in-ms-teams/1c2fe279-7af3-44a5-ba2d-60b49c916aaf
Let us know if that doesn't work.
Thank you, I had looked at that article previously and attempted to delete the correlating folders in the Documents section of the Sharepoint group.
It still shows in Deleted Channels with the ability to Restore it. I worry that someone else with permissions might restore it. I haven't been able to determine if it will go away after some time or not, either.
I have just come across the same issue where a client created a channel called Service as a shared channel instead of a private channel. Deleting the channel will take 21 days to purge, preventing them from creating a new "service" channel as a private channel. I decided to restore the deleted channel. Once the original "service" channel was restored, I renamed the channel in teams and then re-deleted the channel. I was then able to create a new channel with the same name, "Service", and make it a private channel upon creation. The old shared "service" channel can now sit in the deleted stage 2 recycling bin and be purged after 21 days.
