Solution · External contacts
External contacts on every work phone: partners, suppliers and accountants from Exchange Online
The accountant, the bank, the haulier, the electrician: in many organisations IT maintains such contacts once, centrally, in the Exchange admin centre. Outlook on the computer finds them in the global address list. None of it reaches the work phone. GALYNSKI takes these mail contacts as a source and writes them as a contact folder into the mailboxes, updated daily, with no extra app and no device management.
The problem: a directory entry is not a contact
A mail contact in the Exchange admin centre is an entry in the directory, just like a colleague in the global address list. Outlook looks it up live when addressing an email but never stores it as a contact in the mailbox. Only what is stored as a contact in the mailbox reaches the phone. A directory entry that never existed as a contact in the mailbox cannot appear on the device. When the accountant calls, the screen shows a number.
What the built-in options can do and where they stop
| Option | What it does | Where it stops |
|---|---|---|
| Mail contact in the Exchange admin centre | Listed in the global address list; Outlook finds it when addressing, distribution groups can contain it. | Online only, Outlook only. It is not on the phone, caller ID stays empty. |
| Maintain the same contacts additionally in a shared mailbox or a SharePoint list | Can be distributed. | A second place to maintain. Whoever changes something in the admin centre has to repeat it there, or the other way round. |
| Every person copies the contact into their own Outlook contacts | Brings the current state onto the device once. | Every person does it themselves, nothing updates, deleted contacts stay in the address book. |
| Your own script (PowerShell, Microsoft Graph) | Reads the organisation contacts and writes them into all mailboxes with an application permission. | Needs maintenance for changes, deletions, duplicates and throttling. Microsoft has been blocking EWS-based scripts gradually since 1 October 2026, and entirely from April 2027 at the latest. |
How GALYNSKI distributes external contacts
- Connect. An administrator grants GALYNSKI admin consent in the tenant once. For this source that includes the read permission OrgContact.Read.All: it reads the organisation contacts and never writes there.
- Choose the source. In an address book, say “Vendors”, choose the source “External contacts (organization contacts)”. External contacts exist only once: as one source in the address book where they belong.
- Set the recipients. All users or specific groups, say only purchasing and management.
- Nightly run. In the window from 02:00 to 05:00 local time, GALYNSKI writes the contacts into the address book’s folder in every recipient’s mailbox: name, email address, job title, department, business and mobile number, company, business address. Contacts without an email address are not included and are counted in the report. Photos are not transferred.
- Onto the device. The folder appears by itself in Outlook on the computer and in the Outlook app. The contacts reach the contacts app and caller ID through the Outlook app: on Android with “Sync Contacts”, on the iPhone with “Save Contacts”. No extra app, no MDM profile. More in the guide Company contacts on Android.
What organisations use this for
- The accountant, the bank and the insurer are on every phone of the management team, with a name on the screen.
- Purchasing and the warehouse reach suppliers and hauliers without entering them themselves.
- Partner companies on a project are in the whole project team’s address book for as long as the project runs.
- The list that already exists in the admin centre stays the only place to maintain it.
Limits, stated plainly
- External contacts exist as a source only once per organisation. Several lists belong in a shared mailbox or a SharePoint list.
- Contacts without an email address are not included; the report counts them.
- Photos are not transferred.
- Distribution runs in one direction: maintenance happens in the Exchange admin centre, not on the phone.
Data protection and operations
- The contracting party is SSIG-IT GmbH in Germany; the DPA (with English text), sub-processors and technical measures are public. Hosted in the EU.
- Read only: GALYNSKI reads the organisation contacts, and only when an address book uses this source. It writes solely into its own contact folders in the recipients’ mailboxes.
- Protection against mass deletion: if the source is empty, incomplete or suddenly much smaller, GALYNSKI stops the affected address book before a single contact is changed, and reports the reason.
- Every run is in the dashboard with counts and notes. The report arrives by email when something changed or an error occurred. What GALYNSKI processes is set out in the documentation Data protection, the sources in Sources and recipients (German).
Price
4.00 € per user per month, or 36 € per user per year on the annual plan. From 51 users 3.60 € or 33 €, from 251 users 3.20 € or 30 €, each plus VAT. External contacts cost nothing extra; counted are the users who receive contacts, not the contacts. All prices on the pricing page.
Frequently asked questions
What exactly are external contacts?
The mail contacts an administrator creates in the Exchange admin centre under “Recipients”: people outside the organisation with an external email address, such as partners, suppliers or the accountant. They appear in Outlook in the global address list. GALYNSKI calls this source “External contacts (organization contacts)”.
Which permission does GALYNSKI need for this?
Read access to the organisation contacts, which the administrator confirms once when connecting to Microsoft 365. It is read only when an address book uses this source; nothing is ever written there.
What happens to contacts without an email address?
They are not included. The report after the run counts them, so you can see which entries in the admin centre need an address.
Are photos of external contacts included?
No. Transferred are name, email address, job title, department, business and mobile number, company and business address.
What happens if someone deletes many contacts in the admin centre?
If the source is empty, incomplete or suddenly much smaller, GALYNSKI stops the affected address book before a single contact is changed, and reports the reason. As soon as the source is complete again, it continues.