How to troubleshoot the outlook offline address book in an office 365 environment

Introduction

This article describes how to troubleshoot the following Offline Address Book issues in Microsoft Outlook in a Microsoft 365 environment:

• Users can't download the Offline Address Book.

• Synchronization errors occur in the Offline Address Book.

• You receive nondelivery report (NDR) messages when you use the Offline Address Book to send email messages to users.

• You receive the following error message when you run the Send/Receive command in Outlook in Cached Exchange mode:
  
  Task 'Microsoft Exchange Server' reported error (0x8004010F): 'The operation failed. An object could not be found.'

Procedure

To troubleshoot these issues, follow the steps below. After you follow each step, test to see whether the Offline Address Book issue has been resolved. If the issue is resolved, it's unnecessary to continue to the next step. If the issue isn't resolved, proceed to the next step.

Step 1: Make sure that the global address list (GAL) is up to date

Check whether the GAL is up to date. To do this, ensure that you can view any changes in the GAL by using Microsoft Outlook Web App. If the expected changes aren't present in the GAL, the changes will not replicate to the Offline Address Book.

NOTE: If you change your on-premises Active Directory schema, but the Microsoft Azure Active Directory Sync Tool still doesn't synchronize these changes correctly, go to this Microsoft website to continue troubleshooting this issue:

    Troubleshoot directory synchronization

If the Online Address Book is correct but the Offline Address Book is still incorrect, go to the next step.

Step 2: Manually download the Offline Address Book and then make sure that Cached Exchange Mode is enabled

Manually download the Offline Address Book in Outlook. This may also resolve nondelivery report issues if you're using an outdated version of the Offline Address Book. For more information about how to manually download the latest copy of the Offline Address Book, click here:

    You can't find a user in the offline address book in Microsoft 365

Next, ensure Outlook is set up to use Cached Exchange Mode. To do this follow these steps:Take one of the following actions:

1. If you're running Outlook 2007, click Tools, and then click Account Settings.

2. If you're running Outlook 2013 or Outlook 2010, click File on the Office ribbon, click Account Settings, and then click Account Settings.

3. In the E-mail Settings dialog box, select the Microsoft Exchange account that you want, and then click Change.

4. In the Microsoft Exchange Settings dialog box, make sure that the Use Cached Exchange Modecheck box is selected.

Step 3: Check that the Background Intelligence Transfer Service (BITS) service is running

Outlook uses BITS to connect to the URL provided by the Autodiscover service. To determine whether BITS is started, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, click Control Panel, click Administrative Tools, and then click Services.

2. In the list of services, click Background Intelligence Transfer Service, and then make sure that the status of this service is set to Started.

3. If BITS won't start, reinstall it. For more information about how to install BITS, click here:
   
   Windows Management Framework (Windows PowerShell 2.0, WinRM 2.0, and BITS 4.0)

Step 4: Install the latest updates for Office and for Microsoft 365 Desktop

1. Ensure that the latest Microsoft Office service pack is installed.
   
   NOTE: If you're using Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, you must, at a minimum, have the 2007 Microsoft Office system Service Pack 1 installed on the computer.

2. If you're using Office 2007 or Office 2010, ensure that the latest version of Microsoft 365 Desktop Setup is installed. To do this, sign in to the Microsoft 365 portal, select Download Software, and then click Desktop Setup.

Step 5: Re-create the Outlook profile

If the existing Outlook profile is corrupted, this corruption could be the cause of the issue. Corruption may have occurred if Outlook stopped responding. For more information about how to create and to set up an email profile in Outlook, refer to the following article:

   Create a New Outlook Profile

NOTE: See the bottom of this article for the 3rd-party information disclaimer.

Step 6: Determine whether the Autodiscover service is working, and check access to the Offline Address Book

NOTE: If the Offline Address Book issue wasn't resolved by using steps 1 through 5, follow this step for validation before you call Microsoft Support.

Check whether Outlook and the computer can access the Offline Address Book file on the server. This action is typically done by Outlook in the background. It also happens when you force a download of the Offline Address Book in Outlook. To do this check, sign in to the Microsoft 365 portal, and then follow these steps:

1. Start Outlook.

2. Hold down the CTRL key, right-click the Outlook icon in the notification area on the right side of the taskbar, and then click Test E-mail AutoConfiguration.

3. Click to clear the Use Guessmart check box, and then click to clear the Secure Guessmart Authentication check box.

4. Click to select the Use AutoDiscover check box.

5. Type the email address and password, and then click Test.

6. On the Results tab, note the path of OAB URL.

7. Click the XML tab, locate the <OAUrl> and </OABUrl> tags, and then copy the path that's displayed between the tags. Paste the path into the address box in Windows Internet Explorer, add /OAB.xml to the end of the path, and then press Enter.

The following is an example of what the URL may resemble:

    https://autodiscover.contoso.com/OAB/93179f28-4b4d-4e58-aec1-07bb493be4f4/OAB.xml

NOTE: The information that's displayed in the webpage in Internet Explorer. The webpage should contain lots of XML data.

The figure below depicts an example of the information that should be displayed in Internet Explorer.

Still need help? Go to Microsoft Community.

3rd-party information disclaimer

The information and the solution in this document represent the current view of Microsoft Corporation about these problems as of the date of publication. This solution is available through Microsoft or through a third-party provider. Microsoft does not specifically recommend any third-party provider or third-party solution that this article might describe. There might also be other third-party providers or third-party solutions that this article does not describe. Because Microsoft must respond to changing market conditions, this information should not be interpreted to be a commitment by Microsoft. Microsoft cannot guarantee or endorse the accuracy of any information or of any solution that is presented by Microsoft or by any mentioned third-party provider. 

Microsoft makes no warranties and excludes all representations, warranties, and conditions whether express, implied, or statutory. These include but are not limited to representations, warranties, or conditions of title, non-infringement, satisfactory condition, merchantability, and fitness for a particular purpose, with regard to any service, solution, product, or any other materials or information. Microsoft is in no way liable for any third-party solution that this article mentions.