Disappearing Outlook unread emails

On my main PC, I use Outlook's desktop version of the software. My default view is an unread mail view, where I can see all my - as yet - unactioned or incompletely actioned emails in any folder. This is brilliant for workflow.

My emails are stored across multiple folders, depending on how they are triaged as they arrive: I use a LOT of rules to direct emails into appropriate storage folders for later sorting and archiving. I find it helps to keep my filing and records more complete.

So having a COMPLETE unread email view is critical. But recently I went looking for an official email for an ongoing project which had disappeared. I noted a message at the bottom of my inbox window, which said "There are more items in this folder on the server" and to "Click here to view more on Microsoft Exchange". 

So I clicked. My read and unread emails reappeared in that folder, but when I went back to my Unread mail view, the recently downloaded emails were not showing there. I went back to my inbox, to find that the emails had disappeared again, and the message was back. I tried again. Same result in both folders: initially missing emails reappeared, but there was no reappearance of unread emails in the unread email view.

After a couple of hours of hunting down many red herrings (archive, unread not working properly, fault with triaging, incomplete downloads), I found the cause: a recent update by Microsoft had changed the default account settings to only download one year of emails! Perhaps they could have ASKED first?

The fix is: 

• Go to File | Account Settings | Account Settings | Email 
• Highlight/select the account you wish to check
• Click the change button shown under the tabs in the Email dialogue box
• Drag the slider to the far right, "All" (as per the image below)
• Click next
• Click Done
• Restart Outlook

I hope that helps someone else in this position!

Sam