Our analysis: Start with the operational question, not the product name: must colleagues work inside an existing customer mailbox, or must each enquiry have an explicit owner and resolution status? Treat those as different requirements. Choose provisionally, check the administrative prerequisites, and pilot the workflow before making it your team’s default. Google’s documentation establishes available features, not how comfortably your team will use them.
A compact decision table: access versus ownership
Decision row — Existing mailbox access: Gmail delegation lets delegates read, send and delete email in another account without giving them its password. Delegates cannot change that password. Decision row — Explicit conversation ownership: a Google Groups Collaborative Inbox lets appropriately permitted members take or assign conversations, mark resolution states, and search by assignee or resolution status. [1] [2]
Suggested application: Prefer delegation when retaining the existing mailbox is essential and you are willing to define a separate ownership convention. Prefer Collaborative Inbox when assignment and completion tracking are the deciding requirements. Do not treat mailbox access as a duplicate-reply safeguard; establish who may answer before either pilot begins.
Check the address, administrator controls and licensing
For Workspace delegation, delegates must belong to the same organisation. An alias cannot have delegates because it is not a Google Account. Administrators control whether delegation is enabled and can scope it by organisational unit. If a Google group is itself used as a mailbox delegate, the group-access option must be enabled for the mailbox’s organisational unit and each member’s organisational unit. [2] [3]
Suggested application: Ask your administrator whether the customer address is a mailbox, alias or group before choosing. Confirm applicable licensing and whether Groups for Business is available for the intended users; the supplied documentation does not establish subscription eligibility or costs. Keep the pilot to individual delegates unless group-based mailbox access is a specific requirement. Group delegation and a Collaborative Inbox should not be treated as interchangeable setups.
Set up the mailbox-access route
An administrator with the Gmail Settings privilege can open the Admin console’s Apps, Google Workspace, Gmail, User settings, then Mail delegation, enable mailbox delegation and save. The administrator can choose whether outgoing messages identify both owner and delegate or only the owner. In desktop Gmail, after identity verification, the owner opens Settings, See all settings, Accounts and Import or Accounts, then Grant access to your account, Add another account, enters the delegate’s address and sends the invitation. [2] [3]
The delegate accepts the invitation and opens the account marked Delegated through Gmail’s profile menu. Google notes that access may not be immediate. Adding delegates is not supported in the Gmail app. If access fails, check administrator enablement and the documented account prerequisites, including the password-reset requirement and disabling Require user to change password at next sign-in. [2]
Set up the ownership-tracking route
A group owner or manager creates the group and adds the members who will track conversations. Conversation history must be on. In Google Groups, open the group, select Group settings, and under Enable additional Google Groups features select Collaborative Inbox. Grant the relevant permissions: Who can moderate metadata covers taking, assigning and completing conversations; duplicate and no-action-needed handling also appears under Who can moderate content. [1]
Suggested application: Begin with assignment and completion rather than every resolution option. Agree that taking a conversation means accepting responsibility, and that completion requires an answered enquiry or a documented reason to stop. Common mistakes to avoid are enabling features without checking permissions and using an informal ownership convention without telling the second responder.
Run a two-person pilot and rehearse access removal
Suggested application: In a hypothetical repair business, two colleagues handle sample messages about a booking, a changed appointment and a resolved enquiry. Use this pilot checklist: inspect sender identity from the recipient’s view; check whether both colleagues can find the reply; demonstrate assignment in Groups, or your agreed ownership convention in Gmail; and retrieve a completed enquiry. Record uncertainties rather than assuming a passed check.
To remove a Gmail delegate, use Accounts and Import, Grant access to your account, then Delete beside that account. Turning off delegation administratively disables relationships without deleting them; re-enabling it restores them. [2] [3]
Suggested application: Include an access-removal rehearsal. For the Groups route, ask the administrator to withdraw the pilot participant’s access and verify the outcome; no removal procedure is supplied here. Approve the chosen workflow only after both colleagues can explain ownership, completion and departure handling.
Sources
- Make a group a Collaborative Inbox – Google Workspace Learning Center
- Delegate & collaborate on email – Computer – Gmail Help
- Let users delegate access to a Gmail account | Google Workspace Help
Prepared with AI assistance from the linked public sources, checked on 2026-10-13. Examples are suggested workflows, not claims of hands-on product testing.