NOTE: Deleted items are only available for two days after you’ve done a hard delete.

Problem: You “hard deleted” items (e-mails, contacts, etc.) from a folder either via Outlook or WebMail. A “hard delete” is when you either 1) delete items from any folder, which moves them to the Deleted Items folder, and then you subsequently delete them from your deleted items folder, or 2) you pressed Shift + Delete when deleting these items, in which case they bypass the Deleted Items folder.

Solution: To recover these items, you can do so one of two ways:

1. Via WebMail (Outlook Web Access): log in to WebMail normally, then right-click on the folder that you want to recover items from, click on Open in New, and a new browser window will launch.  The URL in this new browser will have a “/?Cmd=contents” at the end; change this to “?Cmd=showdeleted”.  The URL should look something like: http://exchange.easystreet.com/exchange/company.username/deleted items/?Cmd=showdeleted

2. Via Outlook: if the items that you want to recover were emptied or deleted from the Deleted Items folder, then click on Outlook -> Tools -> Recover Deleted Items.  This will give you a list of all the items that are recoverable from that particular folder.  Highlight the items that you need back, and click on Recover Deleted Items.  However, if you did a Shift + Delete from another folder, then you need to add the following registry entry to enable the Recover Deleted Items option inside any of the other folders:

1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).
2. Locate and click the following key in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Exchange\Client\Options
3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following registry value:
Value name: DumpsterAlwaysOn
Data type: DWORD
Value data: 1
4. Quit Registry Editor.
5. Restart your computer.