Dear all,

I've a couple of users who receive the by now infamous "Your automatic reply settings cannot be displayed because the server is currently unavailable. Try again later." error as soon as the try to enable their OOF reply within Outlook 2013. Thing is that only a couple of users receive this error whereas the rest does not, never ever. So it must have something do to with that particular user account.

I tried out all suggestions spread over the internet, e.g.

• IE proxy settings
• IE trusted site settings
• IE intranet site settings
• EWS virtual directory, availability, authentication
• IIS settings
• DNS settings
• Autodiscover settings
• new Outlook profile
• bla bla bla

All to no prevail. I still receive this error. The user opens his or her Outlook 2013 (which runs on Online mode, Cache Mode has been disabled company wide via GPO) and then clicks on OOF in order to enable it - and receives stated error. Thing is you could click to enable a couple of times and maybe after 5 or 7 or 8 clicks it suddenly workes. It's just random.

These are the different articles I already checked:

• http://www.petenetlive.com/KB/Article/0000897.htm
• http://www.techieshelp.com/out-of-office-doesnt-work-after-installing-exchange-2007-or-2010/
• http://www.msoutlook.info/question/879
• http://serverfault.com/questions/677657/exchange-2013-oof-not-working-for-migrated-accounts
• http://blog.shipshapeit.com/microsoft-exchange-out-of-office-replies-not-working-try-this/
• and so on

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi ,

What happens in owa for those problematic users ? Did you influence the same ?

You said that 5 or 7 or 8 clicks it suddenly works . - This point makes to think about that workstations has the reliable connectivity between your domain controllers and exchange servers. 

For a checking purpose Why don't we configure the problematic profile in some other PC  ? Once it done then check the out of office settings ?

Hi Thomas,

This error primarily comes due to the fact that you need to be online and be able to access the CAS live to make the changes to Out Of Office Replies.

Lets try out these options to gather some info:

*See if you can co-relate the affected users by something. Like they belong to same office, site,DB ,Server etc. Common issues like network disconnects, spikes etc.

*"It would be influenced by the network adapter speed and server connection. Therefore, please start Outlook in safe mode to disable some add-ins and try setting OOF again."

*Start some logging and monitor the network connection for those users and compare it to users not having issues.

Even if you set Cached Mode this change will still occur in Online mode.

*Hope you have already tested and found no issues whatsoever, while using OWA to set OOO for the same set of users.

*You might give it a try cleaning Out of Office Rules using MFCMAPI and see if it improves. 

*Go to some user's PC where its working fine, setup the affected user's profile there and see if it works or you get the same error.

*Use resource monitor(or any other) to check which the affected users and unaffected users are connected to which server.

*Is Outlook Credentials different than the Windows Login?

References:

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/0daa017d-3a86-4da3-89da-c65b95fe4177/out-of-office-automatic-replies-wont-enable-when-not-using-cached-exchange-mode?forum=exchangesvrclients

"Your Out of Office settings cannot be displayed

Satyajit,

thanks for your reply and all your suggestions. I'll give them a try one by one. Right now I can tell you this:

• all users are connecting from the same machine, i.e. Windows Server 2012 R2 configured with RDS and Outlook 2013
• connectivity issues can be excluded as both servers are in the same subnet, no firewall in between, DNS and such configured properly
• affected users are either in the same groups, have the same GPO settings applied, or are within the same OU, i.e. I cannot really correlate them
• error appears almost always, i.e. cannot correlate with network related services/issues in terms of high network load, high latency, or such
• the issue never appears when the affected users try to enable OOF with OWA
• Windows Login is in format UPN and reflects the user's default SMTP reply address, for all users identical
  

With all your other suggestions: I'll get right to them and post my results here.

Alex

Hi Alex,

Sorry, missed your name last time.

As you have brought in RDS, the scenario I imagined changed altogether. You can still go with the testing.

However I think we should look into the Exchange Server throtting as well now, which might be one of the things causing this. Though most of the limits pertain per user basis.

Run these cmdlets to find anything that might be limiting you.

Get-ThrottlingPolicy | Format-List
Get-throttlingPolicyAssociation RDSServer | fl ThrottlingPolicyId, Name, DistinguishedName, Identity, ObjectCategory, ObjectClass
Get-ThrottlingPolicy -Identity ThrottlingPolicy2 | Format-List

Is your Exchange on CU8, what the users client OS on.

Look for Throttling logs, event logs etc on Exchange servers to find any issues.

References:

slow online mode "browsing"

Satyajit,

don't mind ;-)

Will do as you suggested as well. Get back to you asap. As of your questions:

• Exchange 2013 (Version 15.0 (Build 995.29))
• ExchangeVersion: 0.1 (8.0.535.0)
• Client OS (as it's an RDS): Windows Server 2012

Alex

I have the following Throttling Policies in place:

[PS] C:\Windows\system32>Get-ThrottlingPolicy | fl name


Name : DefaultThrottlingPolicy_9bf80fff-15ce-490c-8dd7-b8b98552f8fb

Name : SymantecEWSRestoreThrottlingPolicy

Name : GlobalThrottlingPolicy_2c2c4bba-a74a-49f3-b9d4-4030ff2223ab

Name : SymantecEWSRestoreThrottlingPolicyExchange2013

Name : C2ExchangeSync

Then I had a look at the assication with my RDS Server:

[PS] C:\Windows\system32>Get-throttlingPolicyAssociation serv-ctx01 | fl ThrottlingPolicyId, Name, DistinguishedName, Id
entity, ObjectCategory, ObjectClass


ThrottlingPolicyId :
Name               : SERV-CTX01
DistinguishedName  : CN=SERV-CTX01,OU=XD7,OU=Servers,OU=Citrix,OU=Afontis GmbH,DC=afontis,DC=local
Identity           : afontis.local/Afontis GmbH/Citrix/Servers/XD7/SERV-CTX01
ObjectCategory     : afontis.local/Configuration/Schema/Computer
ObjectClass        : {top, person, organizationalPerson, user, computer}

Hi,

According to your description, I understand that some Outlook account cannot access Out of Office Assistant with error, however OWA works fine.
If I misunderstand your concern, please do not hesitate to let me know.

I want to double confirm whether internal or external account experience this problem.
Please run Test E-mail Autoconfiguration with problematic users computer to check OOF URL. Besides, run following command to check OOF URL in Exchange server:
Get-WebServicesVirtualDirectory | FL *name*,*URL*
Note: OOF is based on Exchange Web Services and autodiscover services.

I notice that some outlook client works fine, it indicate that the configuration for server is correct and the issue may be related to Outlook client.
Please try to run Outlook client with safe mode to prevent add-ins and virus factor, or re-create a outlook profile for testing with online mode.
Besides, try to run ExBPA to test OOF to get more details about this question. Additional, I find a similar thread about your question, for your reference:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/81ebc1de-c899-4097-b224-a0e4b33e4162/users-cant-open-out-of-office-assistant
Meanwhile, please try to reset the OOF configuration:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/a390fa29-e493-4aa1-887a-d5328e067a4a/reset-out-of-office-through-powershell

Thanks

Hi,

According to your description, I understand that some Outlook account cannot access Out of Office Assistant with error, however OWA works fine.
If I misunderstand your concern, please do not hesitate to let me know.

=> you are perfectly right

I want to double confirm whether internal or external account experience this problem.

=> we're talking internal only

Please run Test E-mail Autoconfiguration with problematic users computer to check OOF URL.

=> configured correctly and can be accessed with IE

Besides, run following command to check OOF URL in Exchange server:
Get-WebServicesVirtualDirectory | FL *name*,*URL*
Note: OOF is based on Exchange Web Services and autodiscover services.

=> configured correctly as well, both internal and external

I notice that some outlook client works fine, it indicate that the configuration for server is correct and the issue may be related to Outlook client.
Please try to run Outlook client with safe mode to prevent add-ins and virus factor, or re-create a outlook profile for testing with online mode.

=> launched Outlook 2013 in Safe Mode and tried to enable OOF several times,at first the error appeared, whereas subsequent launches worked without any issues => completely random?

Besides, try to run ExBPA to test OOF to get more details about this question. Additional, I find a similar thread about your question, for your reference:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/81ebc1de-c899-4097-b224-a0e4b33e4162/users-cant-open-out-of-office-assistant
Meanwhile, please try to reset the OOF configuration:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/a390fa29-e493-4aa1-887a-d5328e067a4a/reset-out-of-office-through-powershell

=> did that as well; all users have OOF "Disabled"

Hi,

According to your description, I understand that some Outlook account cannot access Out of Office Assistant with error, however OWA works fine.
If I misunderstand your concern, please do not hesitate to let me know.

=> you are perfectly right

I want to double confirm whether internal or external account experience this problem.

=> we're talking internal only

Please run Test E-mail Autoconfiguration with problematic users computer to check OOF URL.

=> configured correctly and can be accessed with IE

Besides, run following command to check OOF URL in Exchange server:
Get-WebServicesVirtualDirectory | FL *name*,*URL*
Note: OOF is based on Exchange Web Services and autodiscover services.

=> configured correctly as well, both internal and external

I notice that some outlook client works fine, it indicate that the configuration for server is correct and the issue may be related to Outlook client.
Please try to run Outlook client with safe mode to prevent add-ins and virus factor, or re-create a outlook profile for testing with online mode.

=> launched Outlook 2013 in Safe Mode and tried to enable OOF several times,at first the error appeared, whereas subsequent launches worked without any issues => completely random?

Besides, try to run ExBPA to test OOF to get more details about this question. Additional, I find a similar thread about your question, for your reference:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/81ebc1de-c899-4097-b224-a0e4b33e4162/users-cant-open-out-of-office-assistant

=> ExBPA is discontinued in Exchange 2013

Meanwhile, please try to reset the OOF configuration:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/a390fa29-e493-4aa1-887a-d5328e067a4a/reset-out-of-office-through-powershell

=> did that as well; all users have OOF "Disabled"

Did some more testing, no luck so far, still doesn't work:

• verified that both servers (RDS an Exchange) only have 1 NIC installed
• NIC Power Management is disabled
• verified https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/81ebc1de-c899-4097-b224-a0e4b33e4162/users-cant-open-out-of-office-assistant
• all IIS authentication and certificate settings are correct
  - EWS: Anonymous and Windows Auth <enabled>
  - OAB: Anonymous and Windows Auth <enabled>
  - Autodiscover: Anonymous and Windows Auth <enabled>
  
• certificate SANs are correct
• internal DNS name resolution works and resolves to the Exchange 2013's internal IP, same subnet as my RDS server, no firewall in between
  
• executing "Get-WebServicesVirtualDirectory | FL InternalURL, ExternalURL" shows:
  

InternalUrl : https://webapp.afontis.de/ews/exchange.asmx
ExternalUrl : https://webapp.afontis.de/ews/exchange.asmx

Hi,

Sorry for delay.
Microsoft Office 365 Best Practices Analyzer for Exchange Server 2013: http://blogs.technet.com/b/exchange/archive/2013/10/01/beta-of-microsoft-office-365-best-practices-analyzer-for-exchange-server-2013-now-available.aspx

Since this issue only occur on internal account, please check the permission of EWS virtual directory:
1. Open IIS Manager, then expand to Site---> EWS.
2. Double-click Authentication, then select Anonymous Authentication and choose Edit to ensure the user identity(i.e. IUSR).

Also, try to reset this ECP virtual directory for testing:
1. Login EAC, then switch to Servers.
2. Expand Virtual Directories, then select EWS which you want to reset, then click Reset option.