Office 365 (Outlook 2016 for Mac) - Unable to open/subscribe to a calendar due to a permission error

There are a couple of reasons why this error can occur:

• At a minimum, you will need "full details" permissions to open a calendar. Any permission below this level will cause this error and the calendar will not be opened. Ask the owner of the calendar to grant you the appropriate permissions.
• You have been granted permissions to a secondary calendar and the permissions are not set correctly.

In this document, you will learn how to share a secondary calendar (not the primary 'Calendar') so that a user who is using Outlook 2016/2011 for Mac can open/subscribe to it. Important: Microsoft is aware of this issue and is working with Apple to find a better workflow than requiring the owner of the calendar to have to use an Outlook desktop client to set the permissions.

1. If the secondary calendar was created using Outlook on the web, then skip to the grant permissions section.
   
   
2. Start Outlook 2016/2013 for Windows.
   
   
3. Go to "Folders".
   
   
4. See if the secondary calendar is a sub-folder of the primary 'Calendar'. Learn more.

   if so:

   continue to the grant permissions section

   If not:

   move the secondary calendar to the primary 'Calendar' - Within Outlook, choose "Calendar" from the navigation bar along the bottom. Left click-hold the secondary calendar and drag it on top of the primary 'Calendar' and release. Then continue to grant permissions section

1. Start Outlook 2016/2013.
   
   
2. Right-click on primary “Calendar” and select ‘Properties’ from the sub-menu.
   
   
3. Click on the ‘Permissions’ tab.
   
   
4. Click Add and search for and add the user you want to share with.
   
   
5. Select the user and then choose “Contributor” from the permissions level select box.
   
   
6. Uncheck “Create Items” from within the ‘Write’ group and click Apply.
   
   
7. Outlook may go into ‘not responding’ mode – be patient. It may take minutes for this action to complete. When completed, click OK.
   
   
8. Right-click on the secondary calendar and select ‘Properties’ from the sub-menu.
   
   
9. Click on the ‘Permissions’ tab.
   
   
10. Click Add and search for and add the user you want to share with (same one as above).
    
    
11. Select the user and then choose the desired permission level – must be set to “Reviewer” or higher.
    
    
12. Click Apply.
    
    
13. Outlook may go into ‘not responding’ mode – be patient. It may take minutes for this action to complete. When completed, click OK.

Once this has been completed by the owner of the secondary calendar, you should be able to successfully access the secondary calendar using Outlook 2016/2011 for Mac. Using Outlook 2016 for the Mac, you can "Open Shared Calendar" for the person who granted you the permissions. You'll see both calendars listed under the user but then you'll only see proper data for the secondary calendar.

For more information, please visit the Office Help & Training site.

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