Forum Discussion
SharePoint Online: "List cannot be deleted while on hold or retention policy."
I am trying to help a client clean up some very old lists and sites. However, whenever I try to delete anything, I get the message above. I've checked for an eDiscovery site, for classification label...
We had the same issue and could not find any hold - retention policies in any place. We had to escalate to Microsoft support and they removed the hold on the back-end.
I hope this helps.
Norm
Are any of the list items on Compliance Hold?
Go to the list - switch to Classic Experience - select the list item - click the ... - select Advanced - Compliance Details. If the Hold Status is On Hold you can remove from hold from this dialog box.
OR a more simple approach:
- Delete the list items first
- Then delete the list object
This worked for me! First deleting all items within the list then allowed for me to delete the list itself. Thanks so much!
