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NICRU's avatar
NICRU
Copper Contributor
Apr 30, 2020

Preventing attendees from starting meeting before organiser

Is there a way to prevent invited attendees from starting the Teams meeting before the organiser starts the meeting? My students are able to start the meeting early without me being there but I'd like to be the only person who can start the meeting that I scheduled with them. 

 

Thanks in advance. 

  • NICRU  You should be able to change your Teams meeting options and set the 'who can bypass the lobby' to 'Only me'. This means that everyone will wait in the lobby until you join and let them into the meeting

  • David_Klempfner's avatar
    David_Klempfner
    Copper Contributor

    It's almost 2023, has this been fixed yet? At my work, people get a 15 min reminder about a meeting, start the meeting, then leave when they see no one is there. Then someone else sees the notification that the meeting started, joins, sees no one is there and leaves, ad infinitum.
    I don't want to prevent people typing in the chat, or make people go to a lobby.
    I just need a check box when setting up the meeting that says "Only the meeting organiser can start the meeting".

    • PaterDomus's avatar
      PaterDomus
      Copper Contributor

      You can for over a year now. Just adjust the meeting settings after you have created the meeting.

      • youngsjess's avatar
        youngsjess
        Copper Contributor

        PaterDomus Could you be more specific re: "adjust your settings"? It's 2024 now, and I still do not have anything in my "meeting options" that prevents attendees from starting a meeting before the host. They can be sent to the lobby, but that is NOT the same as preventing them from starting the meeting. It will still start the meeting, and it will notify other attendees that it started, which causes confusion. This is what DavidKempfner explained. I do not see any setting that specifically prevents anyone but the organizer from starting it, as you can do on Zoom.

        For example, when a Zoom meeting is set so that only the host can start it, if an attendee tries to enter, they will get a message saying it hasn't started yet. If a lobby/waiting room is enabled, they will ONLY be admitted into it after the host opens the meeting. Then the host can let them in from the waiting room after that. No one else would know they tried to enter early, so it does not confuse. This needs to be an option on Teams, and from what I can find, it still is not.

  • Tmadhikarmi's avatar
    Tmadhikarmi
    Copper Contributor

    As an Admin you cannot end the meeting someone accidentally left a day ago. You have to ask them to end it. And they do not know which meeting.

    • MDPtusd's avatar
      MDPtusd
      Copper Contributor

      PositiveEnergy This is not the issue.  I already have my lobby set up like that.  I (and I think several others) are talking about the fact that students can start meetings and sit in the lobby for hours.  Most of the time when I join a meeting I have a similar message to the one attached. For those who are not educators and can't figure out why this is a problem, students are very good at getting around doing things they should be doing.  If they start all of their meetings in the morning, they can walk away from their computer and be "in" class without actually attending.  I know this is happening because sometimes, I end the meeting and restart it myself and not all of them come back.  I've also left meetings going after class time and have "students" sitting there well into their next class.  I know there is a setting at the district level but clearly our district doesn't feel it is important enough to change.

  • NICRU  You should be able to change your Teams meeting options and set the 'who can bypass the lobby' to 'Only me'. This means that everyone will wait in the lobby until you join and let them into the meeting

    • Vanessa_Williams's avatar
      Vanessa_Williams
      Copper Contributor

      Deleted Thank for for posting the screen shot. Can you go back even further? I do not know how to get to that--I looked in my scheduled meetings and on the actual Team and did not see those choices. 

      • Zeinab000's avatar
        Zeinab000
        Copper Contributor
        You access it from manage permission during meeting or while attendees are joining or from schedule meeting
    • burrowsa's avatar
      burrowsa
      Copper Contributor

      Deleted  I have teachers who have set up their permissions this way and students are still starting the meeting before the teacher. 

      • Harold Conrad's avatar
        Harold Conrad
        Copper Contributor

        burrowsa Things in Teams have gotten much better since last year. I have a good friend who was sent to "teacher jail" with pay for a month because students stayed in the class meeting after he left and one of them shared inappropriate content. The option to end the meeting for all users was not available at that time. 

  • Steve880's avatar
    Steve880
    Copper Contributor

    NICRU 

     

    My solution may or may not work for you.  But I have found that if I set the "manage channel" permissions to "only owners can post messages", then I am the only one who can start a meeting, since I am the only owner.  Members cannot start meetings at that point.

     

    This is how I keep my high school students from starting meetings without me or starting their own meetings I cannot supervise.

    • MsPennie's avatar
      MsPennie
      Copper Contributor

      Steve880I checked my permissions, and they are indeed set as you have described, but my students are still able to start the meeting without me. I have it set to send them to the lobby, but I would prefer it if they did not start the meeting.   Do you have any suggestions as to what other settings I might check? 

    • MDPtusd's avatar
      MDPtusd
      Copper Contributor

      Steve880 I may be asking this too early (I haven't read through the entire thread) but if you do this does it prevent them from chatting during the meeting?

      • Steve880's avatar
        Steve880
        Copper Contributor
        Yes. It prevents them from typing in the conversation window. So I quickly change that setting once I am in the meeting to allow them to post. Its a pain...but it stops the surprise meetings.
  • Currently you can't prevent this. But there is two updates coming to Teams.

    One will change so that only users with permissions to create meetings will be able to start meetings. So if your students don't have access to start meetings themselves, they won't be able to start others meetings. This will start roll out in May.
    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/roadmap?filters=&searchterms=63355

    The other option is that you will be able to set that everyone except you have to wait in the lobby, this is a uservoice request that Microsoft said they are planning to implement. Vote for this to get it faster.
    https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/599053-schools-and-universities/suggestions/39962434--wait-in-lobby-for-student-participants-in-sche?tracking_code=dd403596813cb15d18b9015d571ebbd5
    • Dsteenkamer's avatar
      Dsteenkamer
      Copper Contributor
      The lobby has been the default setting for organising meetings since last week, depending on your update schedule.

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