One of my users is having strange issues with his contacts in Outlook 2013, specifically with the search index and history. Research does not seem to have been my friend in this case so I'm hoping someone here might be able to point me towards an answer.

When he tries to search for a contact, he gets the message that "Search results might be incomplete because items are being indexed". Since that seems to be a fairly common problem, it wasn't hard to find advice on making sure that Outlook files are included in the system index and on rebuilding the index. The first time around, rebuilding took considerable time but seemed to solve the problem, though only temporarily it seems. This time around, rebuilding seems to have been almost instant, except that Outlook ignored it and still gives the same message "Search results might be incomplete..."

The other major problem he's having is on the contact details screen. On the mail history tab, some of the contacts, long established contacts with a great many messages passed back & forth, are showing no items. Other contacts are displaying their history normally. The confusing part is that there doesn't seem to be any real pattern to which contacts' histories will display and which won't. The one thing he did mention is that the reindexing seemed to have no effect.

Hi,

Which type of email account is the user using? POP3, IMAP or Exchange?

Does the instant search feature work for email messages?

To troubleshoot the issue, please first make sure the Windows Search feature is installed and running correctly. To verify this, please follow:

1. Press Windows key + R to open the Run command.

2. Type services.msc in the box and press Enter.

3. Locate the Windows Search service, and then make sure the status of the service is Running. If the Windows Search service is not running, right click the service and then click Start to start the service.

Additionally, you should not start Outlook 2013 by using the Run as administrator command.

If above doesn't fix the issue, please also try using the Inbox Repair Tool to scan and repair your Outlook data files. For your reference: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/272227

If you are using OST-files, just delete the OST file, or rename it to .old and then restart Outlook to sync a new one.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Steve Fan
TechNet Community Support

Hey,

I checked the search service and found it running. I also double-checked the email account; it's POP3. The inbox repair tool also helped clear out some errors that had crept in.

While talking to my user, though, he complained that his contact details screen would show a history of emails he'd received from a contact but not those he'd sent. So, it seems like I've been looking in the wrong direction for his answer. Is there a way to get the contact's mail history to show messages they've received as opposed (or in addition to) those they've sent?