Outlook is one of the popular email clients being used, but what happens when your email client does not show your mails. In the last few days, I have read a few articles about a bug that stops the sender from seeing the mail they are Typing. Even though this is not the only reason it happens here are some steps you can try to rectify the problem.
Outlook Safe Mode
Starting outlook in safe mode will turn off and stop any unnecessary items from starting with outlook. This would be the first step as this will eliminate if the problem is with Outlook Application or the Data being Read. There are really two ways that works best for this.
CTRL
On the keyboard hold in the CTRL button while clicking on Outlook. You will be presented with a Pop-up showing that “You’re holding down the CTRL Key. Do you want to start Outlook in Safe Mode?” Click Yes.
Outlook will open the request you to choose which Profile you wan to load. Select the current Profile and click OK.
Command
The second way is opening a Run Command. Most commonly by pressing the Windows + R command at the same time. Remove all text within the “Open:” Field and type in “outlook /safe”. This will go through a similar process as the above section.
Outlook Swithces
Outlook as many of Microsoft’s applications has certain switches that can be used to control how the application responds. Click Here for a list of common switches used by Microsoft applications example. Word, Excel, and Outlook.
A switch I frequently use when having display issues in Outlook is: outlook.exe /resetnavpane
Add-Ins
Even though safe mode does disable the Add-ins for that instance. It is a good idea to disable Add-ins permanently.
Within Outlook click on File -> Options. In the outlook options choose Add-Ins on the Left had side at the bottom where it request “Manage:” make sure it shows “COM Add-ins” then Click “Go…“
On the “COM Add-in” Popup unselect all Add-ins not being used. Bare in mind that the AV Add-on has been a cause of issues in outlook previously. When turning it off and it is not the problem I highly recommend rather turning it back on again.
Offline Items
When using some Exchange you will have an option to Clear Offline Items. This will remove all Items that has been previously downloaded and then download them as if it was never done before. This is not the same as resetting up the Profile but similarly it is Network intensive especially if the exchange is not onsite and needs to download via an internet connection.
To Clear Offline Items, Alternate-Click (Commonly know as Right-click) on the Inbox of the profile giving issues and choose Properties. Within the Properties, under the General TAB, you will find a button “Clear Offline Items”
There is no waring about what is going the happen, it simply clears the Items and gives a message “Your data was removed from your Outlook Data file (.ost).” The one thing to note is this is Folder Specific. So this will only Clear for the folder (In this case the Inbox) that you selected.
Last Resort
Depending on the error you are receiving and the user that you are currently busy troubleshooting you might have to resort to Recreating the Profile completely. As there are various Operating systems with different ways of doing this, the best option would be to get your IT Department to do this if this is not already them.
This Simplest for Windows 10 Users would to to go to the control Panel and search for Mail. Select Mail on the Mail Setup window choose “Show Profiles”
On the Mail windows Click “Add…” Create a new Profile. A suggestion is to use the Date as it will give an indication on when the profile was created if new issues arrive in the future.
Once your new profile is created it will take you through the setup. This setup is controlled by your IT \ ISP. They will give you instruction on how to continue with the setup depending on their configurations used.