These screenshots were taken using Outlook 2003 on Windows XP. We recommend not using Outlook or Outlook Express, as they are highly susceptible to virus infection. Use Thunderbird instead.

However, if you want to use the email mail-merge function of Microsoft Office, you will have to set up Outlook.

In the account setup wizard, choose an “IMAP” account for setup, then enter the following settings (substituting yopur own name, email address and account name):

Also click on “More Settings” and the “Advanced” tab to select SSL encryption for incoming mail:

These settings should be enough to let you read and send email using Outlook (although, even if you need to use Outlook for mail-merge, we recommend you use Thunderbird for all other email).

Finally, in order for mail-merge to work, you need to choose Outlook as the default mail program in Windows. You can do this by opening the “Internet Settings” Control Panel, then the “Programs” tab, and choosing “Microsoft Office Outlook” under E-Mail.

Outlook will only merge using the default email account - if you have more than one account set up, you aren't able to choose which account to send from; you need to change the default account in Outlook first.

As you're probably using Outlook only for mail merges, it might be easiest to simply have only one account defined, and change the “Your Name” and “E-mail Address” values (in the first picture, above) for it to suit your merge (leaving the username and server values alone).

You can do this from the “Tools” → “E-mail Accounts” menu, then choosing “View or change existing e-mail accounts”.

Normally Outlook saves sent messages to a local “Sent Items” folder. To change this to save to the Sent folder on our server, please consult Microsoft Knowledgebase article 198854 (which refers to Outlook 2000, but the procedure is very similar for Outlook 2003).