SOLVED

How to remove the Welcome Message when a new member joins a group.

Brass Contributor

We are moving from an on-premise Exchange 2013 environment (using Hybrid) and we have to move our DLs to the cloud.  I can create them through powershell as a distribution group, but that does not write back to our local AD (using AADConnect).  So using the Unified Group commands, I can create them and they write back.

 

The problem is the welcome message.  We are not ready for users to use the extra features of the groups, plus we have users that are a part of several hundred DLs, based on what customers they take care of.  

 

I see the attribute WelcomeMessageEnabled, but am unable to change that to $False.  I have also tried using mail rules to delete the message based on content in subject or body, but again no go.

 

Does anyone have any way of turning these off?  This will create a huge helpdesk and support nightmare if I can not turn these off.

 

Thanks, Jason.

34 Replies

I'm not aware of any method to bypass the message. @Christophe Fiessinger might be able to help or take some feedback on this.

best response confirmed by Jason Hopp (Brass Contributor)
Solution

You can use the following command to suppress the welcome message for any new users added to the group as a member. The default value will be set to true for this parameter. So you will need to pass "false" as the value to suppress the welcome message.

 

Set-UnifiedGroup <groupname> -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$<true/false>

 

 

Thank you so much Siva.  That worked great.  This will help tremedously. 

 

Jason

Great update! Did this parameter just get released?  It is not currently listed on the supporting technet page for Set-UnifiedGroup. 

Seems it's a recent addition indeed. I checked all the parameters available for Set-UnifiedGroup in my PowerShell session before posting the other day. Anyway, great news indeed!

We are in the process of updating the technet documentation. You will have the documentation updated soon.

This is exactly what I am looking for, just to confirm, this is a Cmdlet run at Windows PowerShell - correct?
Actually, I did add the "Identify" parameter and tried the following command, but it was not recognized under PowerShell, any ideas where I need to correct this?
PS C:\> Set-UnifiedGroup -Identify "MyGroupName" -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMEssageEnable:$false

 

Error:
Set-UnifiedGroup : The term 'Set-UnifiedGroup' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or
operable program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try
again.
At line:1 char:1
+ Set-UnifiedGroup -Identify "MyGroupName" - ...
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : ObjectNotFound: (Set-UnifiedGroup:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException

Worked as you guided - thanks a lot!

Suppose -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled switch is not available in our environment and we cannot disable it.

 

What could be the solution ?

Here is how I did switch off/on the new group member welcome message.
First of all, you need to connect to the O365 Exchange Server Online.

1. Open Windows PowerShell command window as Administrator

2. Run the command: $UserCredential = Get-Credential

3. Run the command: $Session = New-PSSession -ConfigurationName Microsoft.Exchange -ConnectionUri https://outlook.office365.com/powershell-liveid/ -Credential $UserCredential -Authentication Basic -AllowRedirection

 

4. Run the command:  Import-PSSession $Session

 

5. Set-UnifiedGroup "MyGropuName" -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$false


(For switching on the Welcome message, the same command but "$true"  in the end.)

 

 

Can this be done across the board for all groups or does it have to be done individually?

Hi Brian, actually I am not sure if you can do multi-groups in one command. From my experience, you need to set it for each. However, this is a one-time setup, you can connect to your Exchange account and need just change the command for the setup each time by entering one after the other group name and run. 
Maybe somebody else from the community could accomplish this in a one-step command.

Thanks

-w

Here's a quick PowerShell script I threw together that may help:

 

$UserCredential = Get-Credential

$Session = New-PSSession -ConfigurationName Microsoft.Exchange -ConnectionUri https://outlook.office365.com/powershell-liveid/ -Credential $UserCredential -Authentication Basic -AllowRedirection

Import-PSSession $Session

#Get all Office 365 Groups that have have the Welcome Message enabled
$O365Groups = Get-UnifiedGroup | Where-Object{$_.WelcomeMessageEnabled -eq $true}

#Iterate through the Groups, disabling the Welcome Message
foreach ($group in $O365Groups)
    {
    Write-Host "Disabling Welcome Message on O365 Group: " -NoNewline; Write-Host $group.DisplayName -ForegroundColor Cyan
    Set-UnifiedGroup $group.Identity -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$false
    }

#Close the Session
Remove-PSSession $Session

 

I've commented it, but basically it gathers the Office 365 Groups in your Tenant that have the Welcome Message enabled and then loops through them disabling the Welcome Message. You can run this as needed.

 

Hope it's useful for someone out there. :)

Unfortunately there is a bug associated with this parameter:

After setting -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$false, all new user don't get the standard auto invitation but external users also wont be able to login anymore. All they get after authenticating is a "User not in directory" error, even thou they are listed correctly as members in the group and as external users in Admin Center.

It appears there is more functionality associated with this switch then just sending out emails.

This needs to be fixed ASAP.

Hello Everyone,

 

Even after executing the below command successfully against my O365 Group -I see that the users are getting the invite email. Can you please confirm if this command really works

 

Set-UnifiedGroup -Identity testOGroupB -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$false

 

 

Thanks & Regards,

Bhanu

As per your screenshot, the email came to your O365 group. Custom powershell prevents sending email to actual email.

Keep in mind all of the other services tied to Office 365 Unified Groups that generate these emails as well. It should be accounted for as a part of any Governance/Provisioning strategy:

  • Microsoft SharePoint (Office 365 Group-Enabled Team Sites)
  • Microsoft Teams
  • Microsoft Stream
  • Microsoft Power BI (Legacy work spaces)
  • Microsoft Planner
  • Microsoft Exchange
  • Microsoft Yammer

Disable Welcome Message for Office 365 Unified Groups 

1 best response

Accepted Solutions
best response confirmed by Jason Hopp (Brass Contributor)
Solution

You can use the following command to suppress the welcome message for any new users added to the group as a member. The default value will be set to true for this parameter. So you will need to pass "false" as the value to suppress the welcome message.

 

Set-UnifiedGroup <groupname> -UnifiedGroupWelcomeMessageEnabled:$<true/false>

 

 

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