Quickbooks invoice to Outlook errors

[Nathan Igo]

I have been trying to figure out this issue for about 3 months now and cannot come to a final conclusion. A client runs Quickbooks 2018 with Office 365 and occasionally when they go to send an invoice they get an error message that Outlook is not available. Once they get that error no invoices will move into Outlook as an attachment like they should. What has completely thrown me off:

1. Closing and reopening just Quickbooks will sometimes fix it
2. Closing and reopening just Outlook will sometimes fix it
3. Restarting the whole computer will always fix it (pointing me to some kind of connector issue)

The system has QB 2018 fully updated and the issue has been ongoing from an outdated Windows 10 1809 version when I took them on to a fully updated OS. I have tested both 64 and 32 bit versions of Outlook. I even replaced the entire tower last week with one of the spare systems as it was due for an upgrade anyway with a fresh OS install and the issue came back.

I have looked all over online and its all the typical "set outlook as your default" stuff. Is this just a common issue between QB and Outlook? Is it something common between QB 2018 and Outlook? I am trying to not tell them to upgrade Quickbooks to 2020 only to have the problem still persist.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Can plan the constant cat 'n mouse update game and flip back 'n forth with things, or....

Just set Quickbooks to send email to smtp.office365.com on port 587 with ssl/tls
Using the O365 creds of the user at that computer.

...and stop having to deal with the cranky programmatic access of Outlook.

Preferences...Send Forms.....send email using...WebMail

 

[urcomputech]

Can plan the constant cat 'n mouse update game and flip back 'n forth with things, or....

Just set Quickbooks to send email to smtp.office365.com on port 587 with ssl/tls
Using the O365 creds of the user at that computer.

...and stop having to deal with the cranky programmatic access of Outlook.

Preferences...Send Forms.....send email using...WebMail

I like this suggestion and plan on trying it out myself. Question, are emails sent natively from QB reflected in outlook sent folder? In other words, does QB sync the sent email back to server? Thanks YeOldeStoneCat.

 

[urcomputech]

I've had this same issue and found the only fix, besides YeOldeStoneCat which I think is brilliant, is to roll back Office update. It seems the newer versions of Office/365 are not playing well with QB, or you can say QB is not keeping up with these incompatibilities. Here's a helpful site that explained the how-to of rollingback the Office updates:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us...er-version-of-office-2013-or-office-2016-clic

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I like this suggestion and plan on trying it out myself. Question, are emails sent natively from QB reflected in outlook sent folder? In other words, does QB sync the sent email back to server? Thanks YeOldeStoneCat.

Pretty sure it does (to be honest...never looked)..because is uses the Office 365 mailbox...which is basically exchange..and everything is equal across all devices. if you fire up your browser and read, delete, send email...through outlook web access...and you have a computer at home with Outlook configured to that account..it reflects in that Outlook.

 

[thecomputerguy]

Can plan the constant cat 'n mouse update game and flip back 'n forth with things, or....

Just set Quickbooks to send email to smtp.office365.com on port 587 with ssl/tls
Using the O365 creds of the user at that computer.

...and stop having to deal with the cranky programmatic access of Outlook.

Preferences...Send Forms.....send email using...WebMail

Pretty positive that this will not reflect in the sent items folder as all QB is using is credentials and the outgoing server to deliver the mail item. The benefit of doing it through outlook is it starts in drafts, moves to outbox, then to sent items.

I don't have a solution for OP, I seemingly have similar issues with QB and Outlook occasionally.

 

[frase]

Make sure outlook is closed when trying to send email via QB

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Pretty positive that this will not reflect in the sent items folder as all QB is using is credentials and the outgoing server to deliver the mail item. The benefit of doing it through outlook is it starts in drafts, moves to outbox, then to sent items.

I don't have a solution for OP, I seemingly have similar issues with QB and Outlook occasionally.

I just confirmed that it does save a copy in Sent....on my office rig, I usually save estimates and invoices to a PDF that we keep in folders in Teams...but...I just configure QB Premium to use my O365 creds per what I mentioned above..and I sent my GMail account an estimate..looked in my Outlook work account sent folder..and within 10 seconds a copy of that email synced down and showed up.

It does make sense since it's using your mailbox creds.

 

[Sky-Knight]

You can't send anything through an exchange mailbox via any mechanism without it winding up in sent items.

 

[urcomputech]

I just confirmed that it does save a copy in Sent....on my office rig, I usually save estimates and invoices to a PDF that we keep in folders in Teams...but...I just configure QB Premium to use my O365 creds per what I mentioned above..and I sent my GMail account an estimate..looked in my Outlook work account sent folder..and within 10 seconds a copy of that email synced down and showed up.

It does make sense since it's using your mailbox creds.

It was my gut feeling as well. Thank you for confirming it for the rest of us YeOldeStoneCat.

 

[thecomputerguy]

I just confirmed that it does save a copy in Sent....on my office rig, I usually save estimates and invoices to a PDF that we keep in folders in Teams...but...I just configure QB Premium to use my O365 creds per what I mentioned above..and I sent my GMail account an estimate..looked in my Outlook work account sent folder..and within 10 seconds a copy of that email synced down and showed up.

It does make sense since it's using your mailbox creds.

Well that would be the first time I was ever wrong

 

[VISA MC]

I moved to smtp on QuickBooks about 3 months ago and the annoying thing is it won't save my password. How are you guys getting it to save the password when using the smtp method rather than outlook? I wanted mail to come from a generic billing email address that dumps back into our ticketing system for ant replies instead of my personal inbox.