Somebody at a client eventually asks whether Avvi reads their email, and the answer has to be exact rather than reassuring.

No request returns the body of a message. Nothing Avvi can be asked will produce the text of an email somebody received.

What it reads instead is the delivery record and the mailbox’s own settings. Both are what the useful answers come from.

How it works

The delivery record covers a message’s journey: who sent it, who it was addressed to, its subject line, when it was sent, and whether it was delivered, delayed, rejected or held.

Mailbox settings are separate and also visible. Rules that move or forward mail, whether forwarding is on, who has been granted access, automatic replies, and how much space the mailbox uses.

Neither of those includes what a message said. Whether an email arrived is answerable without anybody reading it, which is why the split holds up in practice.

Quarantined mail is the one case where message detail is visible, because deciding whether something is safe to release is the entire point of looking.

Good to know

Subject lines are part of the delivery record. Somebody who considers a subject line private should be told that plainly rather than discovering it.

Your own access to a client’s mailboxes through Microsoft 365 is unchanged by any of this. Avvi does not widen what your team can already reach.

Whether anybody at the client can ask about a colleague’s mail at all depends on what you switched on for their group. It is off unless you turned it on.

What to do next

When a client asks the question, answer with the split rather than with a reassurance. Delivery record and settings, yes. Message contents, no.

If they want the tighter answer, check which mail capabilities their groups actually have. Most organisations have fewer switched on than they assume.

Find an email that never arrived is the worked example of getting a real answer from the delivery record alone.

FAQ

Q: Can Avvi show me what an email said?

A: No. No request returns the body of a message.

Q: Can a manager use Avvi to read a report’s email?

A: No. No request returns a message body to anybody. Whether they can open the mailbox at all is a Microsoft 365 permission, separate from Avvi.

Q: Are subject lines visible?

A: Yes. Subject lines are part of the delivery record, along with sender, recipient, time and outcome.

Q: What about quarantined messages?

A: More detail is visible there, because somebody deciding whether to release a message has to be able to judge it.