Disappearing emails

[#1]

Thanks, I've attached a snip of the Laptop Outlook internet settings.  It says delete after 10 days...but I had 6-7 weeks worth of emails disappear off my phone in one go.  I thought I might find them in the Trash, but they were not there.

My phone is a Vodafone Smart N8.  So far nothing untoward has happened further today.  Same emails on my Laptop as on my mobile phone - that is normal.

[#2]

Thanks for the detail and screenshot.

Looks like Outlook may have been the culprit here  when the option to remove mail from server after 10 days this will mean that all messages are removed as opposed to the last 10 days.

I'd recommend unselecting that option and applying the changes to try to avoid that happening again.

To get them back onto the server you may have to forward them to yourself one by one.

[#3]

I haven't made any changes to the settings though - this makes no sense at all?  Are you suggesting Outlook changed its settings of its own accord?  My laptop sits in my house and my account is password protected.  No one could have intefered with it.

[#4]

Based on the information you've provided here it does appear that the setting within Outlook had changed by itself. It's possible it may have done it as a result of an update, it'll be difficult to say.

However seeing as that option to remove mail from the server is ticked it seems evident that this may be the cause.

[#5]

Sorry to jump in @Hazel74 , but it is possible Outlook did this without you asking for it! MicroSoft has a bad habit of thinking it knows better than the user what the user wants, and has a habit of setting things to default during some updates - which is why I always replace MS applications with ones I can control,if possible.

Did you have any Windows updates just prior to this happening?

[#6]

Hi there,

Thanks for your interest.  The last Windows 10 Cumulative update was 20 May, so Monday.  I doubt Office 2007 (what is on my laptop) has updated though, Microsoft gave up supporting that a while ago.  Usually this is something that goes to pot after a Windows update though.....

So, if I untick remove from server after 10 days, and tick remove from server when deleted from deleted items instead, this should hopefully rectify the issue?  I don't want emails to be piling up on the Plusnet server and for me to not notice then end up getting an email telling me to clear it all out ..

[#7]

@Hazel74 Eek! W10.

I can't comment on the support for Outlook 2007 - as I say, I use as few native Windows programs as possible, but be aware that as they no longer provide release notes for updates, anything is possible.

Your second paragraph should resolve the problem - but keep checking that it doesn't get 'reset in your interests'

Keep us informed.

[#8]

Thanks for your help, will see how it goes.

Cheers

Hazel

[#9]

No problem Hazel, let us know if you need any further assistance.

[#10]

Mixing the use of POP and IMAP when multiple devices are involved is very black magic!  It leads to confusion as described here and there is no clear assurance of where sent items are stored.

Using IMAP on all clients keeps everything aligned, especially sent mail items.

[#11]

Thanks for your interest.  I've had my email set up like this for a year and had no issues.  Something bad happened on Wednesday and we may hae discovered what it was, however my gut instinct lies with the mobile phone - cannot be trusted as there is no proper manual or anyone that knows how it should work it seems.

At one point I had my email set up as IMAP on my laptop, can't remember what happened that I changed it, but it was the biggest mistake I made, as it meant I no longer had a copy of my emails - they were on a cloud somewhere.  I had to download absolutely everything.  Nightmare.

So changed it back, and my phone is IMAP so got copies on my phone and I can delete on my phone and laptop as I wish.  As for sent items, if I send it from the laptop, its in the sent item there, and if I send an email from my phone, its in my sent items there.

It remains to be seen what happened to my emails on Wednesday.  Hopefully there will be no further issues, but I changed my settings on Office 2007, just in case.

[#12]

If all devices use IMAP and all devices are configured to use the SERVER sent folder all sent items can be seen on all devices regardless of where they were sent from.

Doing things the way you are at the moment might leave you needing to look at both devices together to see all replies in a single conversation. Consider: send something from home in the evening, get a call to discuss it the next day whilst out ... you’ll not be able to reread what was sent from the phone.

Whatever this issue was unlikely to have been caused by IMAP on your phone. The delete from server after 10 days on the POP3 client is what ‘did’ for you.

If you can still see all of your emails on your laptop you can restore them to the server if you want to.

Create a ‘new’ mailbox account in Outlook 2007 using the exact same mailbox details as an IMAP connection.

Remove the password from the POP3 mailbox (stops it downloading emails). Then in OL drag mail from the Pop3 inbox to the IMAP inbox. Do the same for sent items.

You’ll then see the same mail on all connected devices. When you are sure that you have all of your mail back on the server you can delete the POP3 mail account in OL. Thereafter all received and sent mail will be seen the same on both devices.

[#13]

Thanks, I don't think IMAP did anything to my phone, its simply Vodafone updates!