Outlook 2013 ActiveSync - syncronization of sub-folders

Problem reported by Arthur Grandovskis - 4/7/2015 at 9:30 AM

Not A Problem

We have a problem with ActiveSync account in Outlook 2013, where sub-folders fail to sync with mail server. Sub-folders are kept under "Inbox" and under other root folders too. None are displaying any email content.

However things appear to work normally in Windows 8.1 Mail app (when set up using ActiveSync).

Did anyone come across a similar problem? Is it a known issue? Also can it be anything to do with ******_activeSync.xml file?

It is a major concern and a mystery as to why this is happening!

Any help appreciated, thanks

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Employee Replied

4/7/2015 at 12:14 PM

Employee Post

Arthur,

We typically recommend moving the subfolders out of the Inbox and keep in the in the root level. There have been several reported issues with Outlook 2013, and 2010 with subfolder under the Inbox failing to synchronize via IMAP and EAS. This doesn't appear to be an isolated incident with SmarterMail servers as it has been reported across several server types.

Please refer to the following KB article for more information: https://portal.smartertools.com/kb/a2850/support-for-folders-within-your-inbox.aspx

I hope this helps !

Duarte Replied

10/28/2015 at 3:19 PM

Hi,
Would not it be easier not to allow the creation of folders inside the Inbox?
Support requests because of this problem begins to be increasingly frequent...

Mark DeLore Replied

5/30/2018 at 12:57 PM

I tried creating a folder outside the inbox and it still does not sync.

Problem is that folders inside the inbox have been working for this user for almost a year and then it stopped.

Ionel Aurelian Rau Replied

5/31/2018 at 12:00 AM

We`ve had all kinds of issues with folders created in Outlook and not syncing back or with folders created under Inbox (in WebMail) which would eventually cause email to stop syncing for that user via EAS.

We simply provide a list of best practices and rules and ask all users:
- Never to create any folders under Inbox, Deleted, Sent or Junk folders
- Never to create folders in Outlook when synced via EAS - create folders only using WebMail
- Ty to organize mails in folders and subfolders so as to not exceed more than 5000 emails per folder

With these rules we`re almost trouble free, even for the users with very large mailboxes (25+ GB)

Douglas Foster Replied

6/2/2018 at 5:48 AM

Microsoft seems to alternate between good releases and disasters: Windows 98 (good) -> Windows ME (bad) -> Windows XP (good) -> Windows Vista (bad) -> Windows 7 (good) -> Windows 8 (bad) -> Windows 10 (good enough)

In my experience, Office 2013 is one of their bad releases. Best bet is to downgrade to Office 2010 or upgrade to Office 2016.

My bad experiences with Outlook 2013 are mostly with IMAP synchronization problems, not with ActiveSync, but the problems may be related. On a complex mailbox, Outlook sometimes gets confused about synchronization. The solution for me has been to disable power save, then leave the computer logged in with Outlook running (screen lock is OK), so that Outlook can synchronize all night. Once the synchronization gets happy, it seems to stay happy. If the synchronization is confused and you close it before going home at night, it spends all the next day trying to get un-confused, but it may not finish before it is shut down again.

Suggest you leave the synchronization running overnight or over a weekend and see if it gets itself straightened out.

I have seen this on more than just SmarterMail, so I doubt that it is their problem to solve.

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