Begin with retrieval needs
Think of information you might genuinely need again: personal correspondence, a current order, account recovery instructions or a record you have independently decided to retain. This guide does not prescribe legal, tax or medical retention periods. Record category names privately and identify a few examples you can find again. The exercise is about your retrieval needs, not keeping every message simply because deciding feels uncomfortable.
Avoid turning a label into a guarantee
A star, folder or label is useful only when the planned action respects it. Do not assume that a marker protects mail from all tools or every kind of bulk selection. Inspect the current interface and provider documentation. A keep list should explicitly say how its examples are excluded from the proposed group and how you will confirm that they remain available afterwards.
Use exceptions to improve the batch
Suppose a retailer sends both routine advertisements and useful order information. Putting the retailer on a blanket delete list conflicts with your wish to preserve receipts. That is a selection problem, not an argument for reviewing less carefully. Separate message types with a trustworthy condition, or leave that sender for manual review. A smaller batch that respects exceptions is more useful than a large ambiguous one.
Check the list after action
Use several wanted examples as retrieval checks after the pilot. Find them through the provider’s normal interface and confirm that the information is still there. Record only the result, not private contents, in any shared troubleshooting note. A successful check does not guarantee every message was preserved; it establishes that the selected examples survived. If any example is missing, stop broad changes and investigate before proceeding.
Sources used for this page
These records support the facts and comparisons above. Merchant-controlled records are labelled so you can separate product claims from independent evidence.
- Clean Email: getting started — Merchant documentation · clean.email · Merchant-controlled · checked 2026-09-26
- Clean Email: starred-message handling — Merchant documentation · clean.email · Merchant-controlled · checked 2026-09-26