External booking & view of availability of meeting rooms (room mailboxes)

Hi Norhr,

I want to confirm what you mean by saying "I don't want any external user to be able to book our meeting rooms".

Normally, you can use PowerShell to allow external users book Office 365 meeting rooms. Here are the steps:
1. Connect to Exchange Online using PowerShell: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj984289(v=exchg.160).aspx
2. Run this command: Set-CalendarProcessing "<Room Name>"  –ProcessExternalMeetingMessages $True

And regarding the room availability, users can select the permission level as Availability only when sharing calendars to external users: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Sharing-your-calendar-in-Outlook-Web-App-7ecef8ae-139c-40d9-bae2-a23977ee58d5

If you have anything unclear, just feel free to post back.

Thanks,
Henry

Hi, sorry - I meant to say that I just want specified external users to be able to book the meeting rooms, I suppose from white-listing a domain or specific e-mail addresses. Is this possible?

Hi Norhr,

It’s not feasible for external users to book a meeting room. Regarding this, you may submit your feedback via this link: https://office365.uservoice.com/forums/273494-outlook-and-calendar . Many features are designed and upgraded based on customers’ comments.

Thanks for your understanding.

Rick

Henry,

I also have this issue.  I tried using the method you outlined above and things began to work as I would like.  I was able to forward an external meeting to the conference room and it was scheduled, but it sent a confirmation email to the external person who created the meeting.  Also the external email user was able to schedule a meeting room with absolutely no intervention on my part.  Is there a way to set it so an internal user can forward an external meeting to a resource and have it automatically approved because it was forwarded by an internal account but not allow it to automatically approve when an external user sends it?  What I want is for the decision for resource schedule to rest with the internal attendee who forwarded it.  However I don't have a dedicated person who can approve all conference room requests.  it needs to happen automajically. :)

Thanks,

Ben

Hi Ben,

“Is there a way to set it so an internal user can forward an external meeting to a resource and have it automatically approved because it was forwarded by an internal account but not allow it to automatically approve when an external user sends it?”

No, it’s not feasible to achieve it.

“What I want is for the decision for resource schedule to rest with the internal attendee who forwarded it. However I don't have a dedicated person who can approve all conference room requests.”  

No, on the contrary, you may assign a special user to approve the external meeting request.

Set-CalendarProcessing -Identity "Room1" -AutomateProcessing AutoAccept -RequestOutOfPolicy *** Email address is removed for privacy ***

Regards,

Rick    

Hello,

This is to request the use of your conference room at the Domain for August 19, 2017 from 12:30 pm to 2:30 pm.

Thanks