Step 2 of 2 · the clean-up, optional

Clean up what the review found, by hand

The review only read. If you decide to act on what it found, your admin makes each change you approve in the Microsoft 365 admin center, a few clicks at a time, with the steps printed under each finding in your report. No new permission, no download.

Before you start

  • The owner has marked each line in approval-workbook.xlsx, saved with the report, as APPROVE, KEEP or MANUAL REVIEW. Your admin changes only the lines marked APPROVE.
  • Anything still needed from someone losing a licence is saved first. Microsoft deletes an unlicensed mailbox after 30 days unless it was converted to a shared mailbox, and an unlicensed OneDrive becomes read-only after 60 days and is archived after 93.
  • Your admin can sign in to the Microsoft 365 admin center as a License Administrator, or a User Administrator to also block sign-in. Global Administrator is not needed.

Each change is your decision, made by your own admin in your own Microsoft 365. These steps are guidance: check each change against Microsoft's instructions, linked under each finding in your report, before you make it. See our terms of use.

  1. Start with "Most important"

    The report puts the biggest savings and the worst risks at the top. Under each finding, How to do it gives Microsoft's own steps and a link to Microsoft's instructions, and names every account involved.

  2. Someone who has left

    Users > Active users > select them > Block sign-in. On the Account tab, Sign out of all sessions. If their mail is still needed, convert the mailbox to a shared mailbox (Mail > Convert to shared mailbox) while it still has its licence, and give their manager their OneDrive files. Then remove the licence: Licenses and apps, clear the licences, Save changes.

  3. A licence nobody uses

    For someone who never signed in or stopped using it, an idle Copilot seat, or a licence that overlaps another: Users > Active users > select the person > Licenses and apps, clear only the licence named in the finding, then Save changes. Everything else about the account stays as it is.

  4. Pay for fewer seats

    A freed licence saves money only once the seat count goes down: Billing > Your products > select the subscription > Remove licenses, and enter the new total. On an annual term this is usually possible only at renewal, so the report shows the renewal date at the top.

  5. A month later, run the review again

    Run step 1 again with the -CompareWith line the review printed at the end. That fresh read of your Microsoft 365 confirms which savings are real and shows what is still open.

Tips that save trouble

  • Check a shared mailbox or meeting room before taking its licence: it keeps working without one only while it is under 50 GB with no archive and no hold. Keep its sign-in blocked; Microsoft advises this for every shared mailbox.
  • Leave administrators' accounts until you have asked them: losing a licence can cut off the tools they manage Microsoft 365 with.
  • If the admin center says a licence comes from a group, it cannot be cleared on the person: remove them from that group, or ask whoever manages it.
  • Write the date in the workbook's "Your note" column as each line is done, so the next review's comparison is easy to read.

The clean-up tool Coming soon

The changes you approve, made for you, so your admin no longer makes each one by hand. It will help you:

  • Take licences off people who have left, and block their sign-in
  • Free the licences nobody uses, idle Copilot seats among them
  • Remove a licence you pay for twice, where one plan already includes it
  • Keep a record of every change, for whoever signs off the bill

You choose every change, in the workbook that comes with your report. Leave your address and we will tell you when it is ready.

Having us help with the clean-up, alongside your admin, is coming later.

Or email ddbloom2@gmail.com. What you write here goes to us through Web3Forms, a form service: see privacy.

If something goes wrong

How do I undo a change?

In the Microsoft 365 admin center, open Users > Active users, choose the person, and give the licence back under Licenses and apps, or unblock their sign-in. Within 30 days, their mailbox comes back with the licence.

The admin center will not let me remove a licence

Either the licence comes from a group (remove the person from the group instead), or the account you signed in with cannot manage licences: sign in as a License Administrator, or a User Administrator to also block sign-in.

Anything else

Email us at ddbloom2@gmail.com and say what happened. Please do not attach the workbook unless we ask: it names the people whose accounts it lists.