How to get back a declined Outlook invitation

Question

I accidentally clicked "decline" on an Outlook invitation and now I can't reverse it -- the event has completely disappeared from my calendar!

How can I get back the event invitation and change my "Decline" to "Accept" or "tentative"?

Answer 1

The invite should still be in the "Deleted Items" Folder. If you go there, you will see the Accept / Decline options again. Click the correct one.

Answer 2

Declined meetings that are part of a series don't appear to show up in the Deleted Items folder. Also, copying from someone's calendar doesn't work with private calendars. In this scenario, there doesn't seem to be a way to accept the meeting other than having someone resend it.

Answer 3

I went to the sender's calendar and clicked the "copy to calendar" button in the ribbon at the top (as described on this page). It prompted me to accept the invite - easy.

Answer 4

Periodically I accidentally delete a request before replying, and I've always had success with just dragging it out of Deleted Items back into the Inbox, then opening it and sending the reply of my choice. I'm not sure I've ever tried changing a response once sent, but all the response buttons do display, so it'd be worth a try.

Answer 5

Once you declined, Outlook copies the 'declined' reply to your Sent Items. Outlook automatically places the original invitation into your Deleted Items. Unless you have your Outlook set to either 1) automatically empty the Deleted folder upon closing Outlook, or 2) you've manually purged the Deleted items folder, you should still have the original meeting invite in your Deleted items folder. Once you locate the original invite in the Deleted folder, you can open the invite and change your response.

Answer 6

Microsoft writes that this issue is by design:

If a meeting request is declined, the meeting is not saved to your calendar and the meeting request message is moved to the Deleted Items folder.

There is no way to show a declined meeting on your calendar. You can only show accepted or tentative meetings on your calendar. To request this feature, go to Outlook UserVoice.

One relevant UserVoice request which can be upvoted is here.

Answer 7

With a regular email you can go to the Sent Items folder and click Recall This Message and Exchange will attempt to recall it. That option does not seem to be available for an invitation to a metting. I also looked at Matthew's answer and my version of Outlook (2003) shows only the declined invite in the deleted folder. I do not have the option to change my response. I think all you can do is ask the sender to invite you again.