Editing text body on invoice email in Outlook, auto deleting when sent

We are having the same problem.  I don't see that the problem can be marked "Solved" as it is not.

Let me share a few details, DossierIT.

Our engineers are investigating about the issue. While we're waiting for a fix, I suggest reaching out to our customer care support. This way, you'll be added to the list of affected users. You can follow the steps shared by AlexV at the top. 

Concerning why the post is marked as solved, the one who originally posted the question may be satisfied by the answer. The users or members are the only ones who can mark it as solved or thumbs up an answer.

If you have other questions, don't hesitate to let us know. We're just one post away. Take care!

I marked it as solved because it answered my question as to why the issue was happening, even though the solution is still being worked on. 

I guess in a sense it is not fully solved until the problem is fixed... but at least now I know it isn't just on my end and there is an actual reason (other than user error). 

I hope this can get fixed soon because it is really adding a lot of labor time when sending invoices since we have to work around it.  

Understood.  Thank you.

We are working around it by clicking "Save" and then opening the message in the Drafts folder to make the desired changes. 

Apparently, many people are having this problem. 

Understood.  Thank you.

Apparently, many people are experiencing this.

We are working around it by clicking "Save" and then opening the message from the Drafts folder to make the desired changes.

I am having the same problem as well, and was told the same thing that it was an Outlook issue, not a QuickBooks issue.  I just updated to the latest version of Outlook 16.0.13801.20266 and still have the problem.  

I did find one work around:

1. In Outlook, and from the Send/Receive ribbon, click "Work Offline"
2. In Quickbooks,  create and send your message as you have. 
3. In Outlook, open the Outbox, then open your message.  (It will have reverted back to the original template at this point.)
4. Make your change(s) again in the message, and close it.
5. Reopen the message in the Outbox.  If it worked, you will see your changes.  You might have to repeat these two steps until it works.
6. When the text is correct, click the SEND button in your message.
7. Go to the Send/Receive ribbon and click Work Offline to put it back online.
8. The message should be sent - you can click "Send All" to speed it up.  If the message is not sent, open it and click the SEND button again.  You will see that the name of the person is in italics when you know it will go out.

Convoluted?  Yes, but it does work!

To me, this is a QuickBooks issue:  there has to be some communication between Outlook and Quickbooks since you can go to the Sent Email tab for a customer and see when an email was last sent.  I have two different paragraphs that I use from my template depending on the type on invoice-and occasionally I go completely off script and I use my own words. But I at least know when the email was sent.   This is an important tool for us and I would like to see this issue resolved.

Hello there, gkbrenne. 

I appreciate you for trying some workaround to resolve it ahead of time. Please know that this issue has already been reported to our engineering team. There’s no definite time frame as to when the error will be resolved, rest assured we’ll keep you posted once there’s an update to the issue.

For more in-depth details about the ongoing investigation, it's best to connect with our support team. This is to add you to the list of affected users so you'll get updates via email. To do so, you can perform the following steps:

1. Open QuickBooks.
2. Go to Help, then select QuickBooks Desktop Help.
3. Select Contact Us. Enter "INV-58175" in the question field and tap Search.
4. Then, choose a way to connect. Phone support may be limited due to volume.

Also, our phone support operation for QuickBooks Desktop is from Monday to Friday 6 AM to 6 PM and on Saturday 6 AM to 3 PM Pacific Time.

You may visit our QBDT Articles page. From there, you'll see different references for managing your business.

Feel free to post here again if you have any QuickBooks concerns. I'll be always around to help. 

We are having the same problem and the support staff does not seem to know anything about it.  

Hi there, @SNun.

I'll share with you some basic troubleshooting that can fix the error. This way, you can send the edited invoice email to your customers.

First, let's make sure to use the latest version of the following before sending the invoice:
 

• Version of Outlook
• Version of Windows
• Any Microsoft updates installed in the previous week or so

You can also update QuickBooks Desktop to its latest release to fix the issue. Doing this can help resolve some minor data problems in your company file. 

1. Go to the Help menu and select Update QuickBooks Desktop.
2. Click the Update Now tab and select Get Updates to start the download.
3. When the download finishes, restart QuickBooks.
4. When prompted, accept the option to install the new release.

Once done, try sending the invoice again. If you're still getting the same result, run the Verify and Rebuild Data tools. These will help us identify the most commonly known data issues within a company file and fix it. 

Additionally, you can run several reports to tell where your company stands. These offer critical information about your business and finances.

The Community always has your back, so please let me know if you have any other questions. I'll be more than happy to help. Keep safe.

Why would you respond to this with such a bogus answer. We already know that Quickbooks is aware of it and will be making the corrections. We are up to date with the latest versions of both Quickbooks and Outlook, I went in and tried again to see if the problem was fixed, but it's still not. 

Please STOP replying to questions with bogus BOT type answers (which you probably are a bot) unless you have something legitimate to bring to the table. 

For anyone trying to do a work around until QB actually does something about it, I have found that when I go to send the email from QB, when it opens in Outlook instead of sending it, I save it as a draft in Outlook. Then I open the draft from my draft folder and can edit the text fields however I want and then send it. It's an extra step, but at least it will let you put a special message in there if needed. Hope that helps! 

Thank you TG20 for spending the time!  I just found out that I am also affected.  I am also like you who need to type different messages before the invoices were sent out.  It has been working fine until sometime in May (checked my sent box record).  It is embarrassing that I had to find out from my customers that my emails were funny.  Also, thank you for the workaround.  You save me a lot of time.  Otherwise, I wouldn't have not known what to do.  Thanks a lot!

Same issue here... We have 6 users on Enterprise desktop, all using Outlook, and only 1 user so far has developed this issue about a month ago.

It doesn't seem as though QB has come up with a fix yet as far as I have searched the forums.

The easiest workaround we discovered is pretty simple, but still an inexcusable bug!

When the email opens up in outlook, before sending it, change the email format from HTML to Rich Text and then right back to HTML. You can do this either before or after editing the default text of the email. The edited text should now be saved and sent as intended.

That has worked for us anyway!

Thanks for the work around idea.  Yours is simpler than the one I came up with.  This is DEFINITELY a QB issue - I have sent my invoices as stated above for years.  When I did my invoicing on May 1, within a day or two of a QB update, the problem occurred.  I tried to contact QB about the issue and have been told that they won't help me unless I purchase a support plan.  I was doing screen share with an agent on another issue and even showed her EXACTly what was happening.  It's not just when you send an invoice, it's when you try to send any email from QB.  I showed her both ways what it is doing.  She told me she would send me an article to fix the issue - she sent me some other article on how to create a template.  It's like these people check their brains at the door - if it is not on their script they are useless.  It is getting to the point where QB is not worth the effort - I'm actively looking for a different product!

Don't expect this to ever get fixed.  These are the little bugs that QuickBooks added to the program that will eventually force us small business into their subscription model and constant reoccurring revenue for them.  This is infuriating.

Thanks for the work around.  I have been having the same problem. I was using the save as draft then opening draft and editing it.  But this looks a little simpler.  It would be nice if QuickBooks would get this fixed.  It's seems like desktop is getting less and less support.  I don't really want to go to the Online version it's a different format.  At that point I might as well see what else is out there. Thanks again for the work around.

I had a user with this exact same issue, but was able to resolve it.  Here is what I did:

1. Disabled caching in Outlook (resolved the issue but Outlook took a performance hit)

2. Updated Outlook to most recent version through Office updater.

3. Enabled caching in Outlook

While performing this, I archived the users content as they had over 26GB of emails.

Once this was all completed, the user was able to edit Quickbooks emails.  Not only that when the email was sent, it retained those changes.

YOU ARE THE SAVIOR, ONLY SOLUTION THAT WORKED!!!

Glad my post was able to help someone. This issue is definitely frustrating especially if you don’t know what is causing it.

This thread began in May.  It is now the end of September.  This matter is not resolved as you say it is.  I don't know what is more absurd, your initial response being marked as resolved or your later reply to a customer comment where you actually double down and defend marking an unresolved matter as resolved.

News Flash: Telling someone to open a support ticket is not a resolution, especially when other users continue to report the same problem for months on end.  QB Enterprise costs far too too justify the many hours of troubleshooting it takes to remain functional. 

In wake of yet ANOTHER QuickBooks support failure I was able to find ANOTHER work around. If you are familiar with QB, I am sure you already come up with a handful of workarounds for other issues.

Disable Cached exchange mode by unchecking the box located under Account Settings > Account Settings > Change.

Hopefully your QuickBooks problem isn't replaced by an Outlook problem. Good luck!

I am chipping in with my two cents worth since this issue has severely embarrassed me - I often add an explanatory note or additional information for the customer to my statement emails, only to now discover that this additional text is just vanishing from the actual sent email! Explains a few things that had been puzzling me, like why I wasn't getting responses to queries I had added to the statement text!

If a solution is ever found for this issue I would be grateful to be included in it's dissemination.

Appears Intuit QB has been unable to resolve this problem. Was sent 'Connect your email to QuickBooks Desktop' by support today. Obviously of no value, I had Outlook working with QuickBooks. 

This is clearly a Quickbooks issue as it stems from the code that QB is passing to Outlook. But I know how devs like to shuffle the blame game. It's also irritating that this has been marked "solved" when it obviously has not been.

Moving on: as we have now experienced this issue on one of our users machines I was able to come up with another quick workaround that may help others:

1) Initiate email through QB

2) In the Outlook new message window click on the "Format Text" menu. Select "Aa Plain Text".
3) Compose your message and send

While this workaround limits some formatting functionality it will at least maintain your intended message.

Your solution works for me. Thank you.

I found out that if you click "Aa HTML" after clicking "Aa Plain Text", it will revert back to the original format while keeping the new composition.