Hi @kath t thanks for posting in the community! Unfortunately admins are required to transfer documents when deleting or delicensing their users (limited-access users are Enterprise only). This applies to both Team and Enterprise level admins and helps maintain the security of information and prevent documents becoming lost. 

However if you are on a Team level account you have an additional option to Remove a user. This will place the user on a Free account outside of the team while allowing them to retain the ownership of their documents. 

For more information I recommend taking a look at our Admin Panel: User management article from the Help Center.

I hope this helps. Please feel free to let us know if you have any additional questions about this!