We have mostly users with Chinese name, i.e. 3 words, e.g. Tan Ah Kow, with Last Name as "Tan", and First Name as "Ah Kow". When Outlook users search for "Tan", all names with "Tan" will appear. If search for "Ah", same results. But if search for "Kow", nothing will be found. Any way to configure such that search will look for all the words?

Hi,

Which version of Outlook are you using? I cannot reproduce this issue in my Outlook 2010 on Windows 8.1.

How did you search for a contact? Did you search it in the Search Contact (Ctrl + E) box?

Which type of email account are you using? IMAP, POP3 or Exchange? If you are using Exchange account, do you have Cached Exchange mode enabled?

Please also try searching using Advanced Find to check the result. In Contact folder, press Ctrl + Shift + F, type "Kow" in the 'Search for the word(s)' field and click Find Now button.

Please provide above information so that we can fix the issue more efficiently.

Thank you for your patience.

Regards,

Steve Fan
TechNet Community Support

Hi

As per the information and details provided by you, please follow these steps to fix this issue: -

Open a new email message.

On the Message tab, in the Proofing group, click the arrow under Spelling.

Click Set Language.

Select the Detect language automatically check box.

Review the languages shown above the double line in the Mark selected text as list. Outlook can only detect those languages listed above the double line. 

Note: Automatic language detection does not work on a single word basis but on a sentence basis.

I hope this information will be helpful for you.
Thanks and regards
Shweta@G 

Hi, 

I am using Outlook 2013 on Windows 8.1 but this is the same issue for all the users, whether it's 2007, 2010, or 2013.

Usually, I would search for contacts by entering names into TO field. If it didn't prompt any recently searched names, I would press Ctrl-K to resolve. Where do I use Ctrl-E?

We are using Exchange 2013. Yup, Cached Exchange mode is enabled.

It's not to find names in the Contact folder, it's meant for users to find names when they are composing emails.

Thank you for your patience.

 I can't post screencaps.

If I am searching for this user "Ng Cheng Heng", I can find him if I keyed in "Ng" or "Cheng", and it will appear in the list, or after I pressed Ctrl-K. But if I search for "Heng", nothing will resolve.

Hope this is clearer for my issue.

Thank you.