Given the following situation:1. When I am in the "owners" account on windows XP and start up Outlook Express to check email2. I switch email identities to my wife's email address3. She receives a few new emails to her identity4. I then close outlook and logoff my windows XP account5. when she logs on to her windows xp account and brings up outlook express6. she does not have those new emails present in her inbox7. Additionally, her contacts in outlook express do not show any contacts that were added when she was using the owners windows account even if she was in her outlook express identityIs there any way to fix this problem outside of getting another computer.Thanks to one an all for any help provided.

The thing that's confusing you us that even though you have two identities defined in Outlook Express, OE considers them both your identities since you're still logged in as you and Outlook Express is storing the files for what you are calling your wife's identity in your Windows profile. You have no access to her Windows profile. Outlook Express believes you are using two identities, not that you have one for you and one for your wife, since you are still using your own Windows username. When she logs in as herself, she has access only to her own Windows user profile and the files she downloaded while logged in as you are inaccessible to her. She needs to be logged in with her own username when she uses mail to guarantee she has access to the messages.You posted your question in an Office Outlook forum. I'll move it to the Outlook Express forum.Brian Tillman [MVP-Outlook]--------------------------------https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Brian.TillmanIf a reply helps, please vote it as helpful. If a reply solves the issue, please mark it as an answer.

Thanks Brian, I understand now how windows is processing her outlook express ....... however, I had thought that the information concerning her outlook identity was being processed through outlook and stored in the same place, and since the outlook program is available to all accounts, her mail/contacts would be stored in Outlook and not in the windows operating system.Since my computer only allows for one person to be logged in at a time and switching between accounts is rather time consuming, is there any way around this problem without purchasing another computer? Do the newer operating system allow for switching accounts faster or does outlook versus outlook express offer better identity handling?Thanks so much for your time.Jim Kempf