After the recent set of updates all client machines (Windows 8 Pro & Windows 8.1 Pro with Outlook 2013) fail to have access to Free/Busy Time. Our Exchange server (2007) we connect to is controlled by a higher IT group; we have access to Free/Busy with Outlook 2010 clients, non-updated machines, and through OWA.

A few things we have noticed with non-working profiles:

1) When checking Outlook Connection Status, SMTP Address only shows "SMTP:" as opposed to a working profile FirstName.LastName@Domain.com

2) If you go into Outlook Account Settings and click Repair, you see "SMTP:" as opposed to the email above. If you click Change you see the correct email.

3) Uninstalling all updates that were applied does not seem to fix this issue. We installed each update 1-by-1 and it seems Free/Busy is broken when KB2768005 (Security Update) and KB2837618 (Outlook) are applied.

4) If you create a new Outlook profile this new profile works and has access to Free/Busy. Even if updates are applied.

While we are able to work around this by create new profiles, this is not a best case scenario; and for some folks would be totally impossible.

Has anyone else experienced this or have an idea to resolve this? Also I see nothing in the event logs.

Thanks much!

We just did some testing. just by installing the Outlook patch will break free/busy

Also, if you have the udpate installed, creating a new profile will NOT correct the issue.

We have the same issue...  Outlook 2013 with an on premise Exchange 2007 server.

Removing KB2837618 ** AND creating a new profile brings back the free busy info.

** One strange thing (IMO) is that KB2837618 appears TWICE in the "installed updates" window (you need to search down thru them to find them).  I had to remove them BOTH.

Come on MS!??!?!  Just a month or so an update broke the nav pane in Outlook 2013!  This is getting old!

Bill

p.s.  forgot to mention that on 3 out of about 30 pcs these updates caused outlook to quit (program has encounter a problem and must close) after about 10 or 20 seconds (even if you were doing nothing in outlook).  for these i manually removed the updates...  seems like a different issue with this same updates.

• Edited by Bill at ISC Friday, November 15, 2013 6:43 PM

Same issue here ... free/busy no longer works.  Also, having an issue where I can't set Out Of Office messages either.

Is there an updated version of this patch?  Is there an official fix or workaround?  Come on, Microsoft!  It's been 3 days already.

Would love to get an official response on this.

p.s.  forgot to mention that on 3 out of about 30 pcs these updates caused outlook to quit (program has encounter a problem and must close) after about 10 or 20 seconds (even if you were doing nothing in outlook).  for these i manually removed the updates...  seems like a different issue with this same updates.

We are experiencing the same issue with Out of Office messages. Again if you have a new profile you are able to access it or if you have OWA enabled it is accessible from there.

@Bill at ISC, I also saw all the KBs entered twice which I thought was odd. We use SCCM for pushing updates so not sure if that is having an affect on that or not. But it was only this months updates that I can recall ever seeing duplicate like that, we saw this on many machines throughout the network.

We also have a case open with MS although no real testing has been done and all we have from them is "We have been able to replicate this and our PG is working on it".

Just a follow up from talking with MS support.

The issue with Free/Busy and Out of Office only seem to happen with Outlook 2013 connecting to Exchange 2007.

Our current work arounds are:

1) Create new Outlook Profile (Control Panel -> Mail)

2) Use OWA

3) Open the Calendar directly as opposed to using Scheduling Assistant

Currently there is no ETA on a hot fix for this.

• Proposed as answer by Tony Chen CHNMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator Monday, December 02, 2013 3:10 PM

Hello

We are having the same issue (as described in TechNet: Forum=outlook Issue-with-outlook-2013). This is not affecting only Scheduling Assistant but also the calendar. As a consequence, the solution 3 doesn't seem to be possible.

Best regards

Yann

I'm having the same issue. But in my case it is worse, because we use CTR version and i can't uninstall updates. I have to completely reinstall Office, disable automatic updating and then go and enable automatic updating for everyone when MS fixes this update. Because CTR can't be managed via WSUS or GPO.

I want to clarify. This is only happening with Office 2013 connected to Exchange 2007? Anyone having same issues with Exchange 2010/2013? We are still on 2007 and won't upgrade in a year or two. Maybe this is another trick from MS to kill off older products like they do with XP? :)

We have the same issue...  Outlook 2013 with an on premise Exchange 2007 server.

Removing KB2837618 ** AND creating a new profile brings back the free busy info.

Same issue here with Outlook 2013 clients connecting to on-premise Exchange 2007, with the same resolution. Didn't see the updates being listed twice though. There's some information on a registry fix for KB2837618 to undo this, but I've run out of clients (and enthusiasm) to test it:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2837618/en-gb

Update: The KB article above now mentions the symptoms here, but doesn't yet provide a fix. The full (temporary until the KB is fixed) solution we are using in-house is:

Uninstall all instances of KB2837643 and KB2837618:

                Control Panel | Programs | View installed updates | Sort by Name
                Scroll through for Security Update for Outlook 2013 (KB2837618) and Update for Microsoft Office 2013 (KB2837643) and uninstall any instances
                Reboot after all have been uninstalled

Use MfcMapi to remove the PR_DELETED_FOLDER_COUNT property:

<your e-mail address> (repeat this for both entries) | Sort by Other Names | Right-click PR_DELETED_FOLDER_COUNT | Delete Property | OK
                Close all copies of MfcMapi
                Control Panel | Users | Mail (32-bit) | Show Profiles | Set Always use this profile to Outlook | OK

Hide these updates to prevent them being reinstalled:

                Control Panel | System and Security | Check for updates | Wait
                Right-click Security Update for Outlook 2013 (KB2837618) | Hide Update
                Right-click Update for Microsoft Office 2013 (KB2837643) | Hide Update

• Edited by Kev Dines Monday, November 25, 2013 4:44 PM
• Proposed as answer by MPompey Friday, February 07, 2014 4:25 PM

My testing has shown that KB2837643 is the problem hotfix.  I've got both KB2768005 and KB2837618 applied and don't have the issue.  It's only when I install KB2837643 that free/busy breaks.

Outlook connection status shows SMTP address as my user ID.

Recreating the profile doesn't work as long as KB2837643 is installed.

• Proposed as answer by Tony Chen CHNMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator Monday, December 02, 2013 3:10 PM

My testing has shown that KB2837643 is the problem hotfix.  I've got both KB2768005 and KB2837618 applied and don't have the issue.  It's only when I install KB2837643 that free/busy breaks.

Outlook connection status shows SMTP address as my user ID.

Recreating the profile doesn't work as long as KB2837643 is installed.

This is interesting. On my Systems it was enough to uninstall the 7618 patch and than recreating the Profile. It Looks that the is different on different Systems. we are running on Windows 8. I don't tested it on W7

Creating a new profile seems to correct the issue for me. When I check the profile side by side with the old profile the user name in the working profile is formatted as username@domain.com.

The broken profile seems to be formatted as Display Name only.

Odd.

• Edited by OTAPablo Tuesday, November 19, 2013 9:07 PM

I made a new profile for the user that was having the problems, but it only fixed the issue temporarily, as the problem came right back the next day.  

I also got a temporary fix by deleting the temporary internet files in internet explorer, but again, the issue came back.  

I didn't see the KB referenced on the PC I was working on, so I was unable to uninstall to see if that solved the problem.  

I made a new profile for the user that was having the problems, but it only fixed the issue temporarily, as the problem came right back the next day.  

I also got a temporary fix by deleting the temporary internet files in internet explorer, but again, the issue came back.  

I didn't see the KB referenced on the PC I was working on, so I was unable to uninstall to see if that solved the problem.  

I can confirm this. Recreating the profile only solves the problem temporarily. After a few hours the issue reappears.

Also, I cannot find the KB's mentioned in the OP. However, it seems that those KB's are bundeled into a Click to run (CTR) office update, version 15.0.4551.1005:

Please refer to this article: http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_sustained_engineering/archive/2013/11/12/november-2013-office-update-release.aspx

Our clients are connecting to an Exchange 2007 environment, and none of the Outlook 2013 users are able to use their calendars now. The issue also affects Out of Office replies.

Please Microsoft, release a fix for this ASAP, as our users are forced to use Outlook Web Access to view/schedule/modify their meetings now.

• Edited by Marco Vindell Wednesday, November 20, 2013 8:11 AM

Can't vouch for free/busy but we're having Outlook 2013 crash if KB2837618 installed (we use Exchange 2007). We disabled KB2837618 in WSUS and f we uninstall KB2837618 (both of them) Outlook no longer crashes, but after a reboot (or a fresh check with WSUS for updates) the PC will now say that it is missing KB2837643 (though it didn't say so previously). If KB2837643 applies then it reinstalls KB2837618 regardless of what WSUS says about the approval status of this patch.

This is not the first time recently that MS have broken aspects of Outlook 2013 with updates (KB2817630 - http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_sustained_engineering/archive/2013/09/11/outlook-folder-pane-disappears-after-installing-september-2013-public-update.aspx)

It would be nice to hear from Microsoft about this latest issue.

I'm experiencing the same issue, but it's happening on Windows 7 64b systems. I also have Exchange 2007.

Yes I agree with all, Microsoft should fix asap!

Creating a new profile didn't work either.

I will try to uninstall some of the latest patches and create the profile and see how that goes.

This teaches NOT to be so quick to install updates again!!

Some of our users have a ridiculous number of pst files.  Wiping out the profile will be a huge pain so this fix looked promising.  My pc is exhibiting this this issue but when I looked at my PR_DELETED_FOLDERCOUNT, the value was 0.  Am I missing something?  I'm not an mfcmapi expert so that is highly likely!

John

Hi,

You can revert your click to run version of office to a previous version using the steps from following article.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2770432

We are having the same problem.

The updated Outlook sets the registry key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\15.0\Outlook\Profiles\<ProfileName>\<UniqueID>\001f6641 to "SMTP:"

Unfortunately, you will have to search through all the sub keys under the profile to find the correct one as it changes from user to user.

You can update this key to "SMTP:<e-mail address>" but Outlook appears to refresh it within a minute of launching and resets it back to "SMTP:". However, you can update the registry after Outlook has launched and it appears to keep it for that session.

Hope this helps

EDIT:

Wrote a VB program to monitor the specified registry value and Outlook resets it approximately every hour.

• Edited by Simon Brandt Thursday, November 21, 2013 10:55 AM

with mfcmapi open your Profile under the Profile->Show Profile

then double-click "Outlook" or how your Profile is named

then double-click "Microsoft Exchange"

then double-click your mailaddress (both) and remove PR_DELETED_FOLDERCOUNT with value SMTP: or correct them

that's all

Correct it with mfcmapi after uninstalling these updates:

with mfcmapi open your Profile under the Profile->Show Profile

then double-click "Outlook" or how your Profile is named

then double-click "Microsoft Exchange"

then double-click your mailaddress (both) and remove PR_DELETED_FOLDERCOUNT with value SMTP: or correct them

that's all

This is what I did and it worked.....ok so far.

Uninstalled all patches of KB2837643, even if it was for another Microsoft programs. I had left some and it didn't work, so make sure ALL are uninstalled.

Rebooted pc.

Go into control panel, mail. Created a new profile, changed that to the default one to load.

Tested and it all looked good

Thanks Hypocrit.  Worked perfectly!

John

Second the Thanks to Hypocrit.  If you need the 64bit mfcmapi utility look here: CodePlex Site

Running Outlook 2013 x64 with onsite Exchange 2007.  Free/Busy stopped working but only in the schedule assistant.  I could "Open Other Users Folder"  and see free/busy but via the scheduling assistant the was "No Information" 

Ran MFCMAPI and deleted the two PR_Deleted_FolderCount (On mine it was PR_Delete_Folder_Count) services  and Free/busy was instantly available again.  Will update if it breaks again.

• Edited by RichG13 Thursday, November 21, 2013 2:01 PM update

UPDATES 12/13 NOV stopping IMAP working

This link sorted the update issue for me immediately but do not reboot until both uninstalled and follow exactly

waiting verification of my details so  cannot paste links today guys http www  inmotionhosting (dot) com support/news general/imap-issues outlook-2013

I actually got here by typing in Google IMAP issues

to clarify go to Inmotionhosting (dot) com and search for Outlook 2013

also stop auto install as this will reload the deleted updates, hide them. There are two you need to deal with.

Gerard

Here are the steps that have worked for us:

1. Control Panel -> Program and Features
2. Select View Installed Updates (upper left had side)
3. Search for KB2837643 and uninstall (you should find 2. remove both)
4. Search for KB2837618 and uninstall (you should find 2. remove both)

Note: it will ask you to reboot. you do not need to do so right away

1. Control Panel -> Mail
2. Create a new profile and move any pst, nk2 files, etc over to the new profile

We also perform a Windows Update check and select Hide Updates when the 2 that you just removed reappears to prevent it from re-installing later.

This is not the ideal solution but for now this is the only way we have found to restore these functions. 

Thank you everyone on this chain for your assistance and helping leading to this solution. Hopefully Microsoft will come up with a fix soon as this is not the most ideal way of approaching this issue.

• Proposed as answer by aaronschnabel Friday, November 22, 2013 5:24 PM

Here are the steps that have worked for us:

1. Control Panel -> Program and Features
2. Select View Installed Updates (upper left had side)
3. Search for KB2837643 and uninstall (you should find 2. remove both)
4. Search for KB2837618 and uninstall (you should find 2. remove both)

Note: it will ask you to reboot. you do not need to do so right away

1. Control Panel -> Mail
2. Create a new profile and move any pst, nk2 files, etc over to the new profile

We also perform a Windows Update check and select Hide Updates when the 2 that you just removed reappears to prevent it from re-installing later.

This is not the ideal solution but for now this is the only way we have found to restore these functions. 

Thank you everyone on this chain for your assistance and helping leading to this solution. Hopefully Microsoft will come up with a fix soon as this is not the most ideal way of approaching this issue.

This resolved my issue.

Outlook 2013 connecting to Exchange 2007. Scheduling assistant stopped showing free/busy times for our resources (boardroom, etc). I followed the listed steps and it resolved it. An updated patch would be nice.

We have exactly the same issue everyone else is having with office 2013 and exchange 2007 server.

After following Clubquarks suggestion exactly it worked.

Thanks for your help!

Now where is that hotfix Microsoft?

We've figured out a way to fix the problem without recreate the profile. Here it goes:

1.       Remove Update KB2837643 and reboot.
2.       Remove Update KB2837618 multiple times until you dont see it in Installed Updates. Then reboot the computer.
3.       Search registry for binary value named 001f6641, until you find something with SMTP:username@company.com in registry.
4.       Copy the value of this binary value.
5.       Search your registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\15.0\Outlook\Profiles\Outlook for binary value named 001f6641, and modify its value by using the above correct value.
6.       Continue search for the binary value 001f6641 until you correct all the values in above registry key.
7.       Youre now good to start using Outlook without having this issue happening again.

Hope this helps!

Ugh.. another bad update

Same problems here......

We only have a few users on Office 2013, but we are seeing this behavior.  I narrowed it down to update KB2837649.  All other updates can be installed without losing the free/busy info.  If that update is installed, the free/busy breaks immediately.  It will return upon removing the update and recreating the outlook profile.

We are also on Exchange 2007 SP3 and Outlook 2010 users are not affected at all.

I am also confused by the TechNet Blog (http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_sustained_engineering/archive/2013/11/12/november-2013-office-update-release.aspx) that states the update is "to improve stability and performance" but in the WSUS console, the Classification is "Critical".  If it improves stabliity and performance, that lends itself to being a "Recommended Update".

so if you don't see the updates, you most likely have the Click To Run Office.  Click to run is set to update automatically and when it downloads the latest updates, it changes your version. your current version has the updates installed in it see: http://support.microsoft.com/gp/office-2013-click-to-run#5 then click on the article for the november updates and it will show you what your version has.

I found this article that describes how to fix it(er...roll back to the previous version):

http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/2013/uninstall-update-office-2013-click-run/

I ran the online repair with version 15.0.4517.1005 which is the version from July and my issues have cleared up. I tried the October version, but it didn't work, however that may be because of incorrect testing.

Hypocrit had the right answer, thanks yo

make sure you delete "both" using the mfcmapi tool

Thanks Hypocrit. This worked great without need to re-install outlook or the profile.

While Hypocrit's solution does work, it is by no means the answer to this problem.

This cannot be done on multiple machines so is not a true solution for any sort of shop with more than a handful of machines.

MS needs to get on the ball with rolling out a fix to these bad updates. Our ticket is still open and waiting on further word from the Product Group Team on their solution to this.

Hello,

I would glad to remove these updates, but I cannot find them under "View Installed Updates" under Windows 7 64 bit machine, there is no MS Office updates session. I've looked line by line and could not find them.

Are they hidden or Microsoft removed them now from this panel? So, how to uninstall them, without seeing them?

Thank you.

Andrey.

• Proposed as answer by DONDI T Monday, November 25, 2013 6:44 PM
• Unproposed as answer by DONDI T Monday, November 25, 2013 6:44 PM

Hi All,

The only solution is to uninstall the updates as shown above and remove the property "PR_Delete_Folder_Count" from the Exchange mailbox. Without that Outlook is unable to display the free/busy information of other members in the organization.  

Hallo??? Microsoft!!! Give some feedback! What't the plan for this issue?

• Edited by honken4 Friday, November 29, 2013 8:50 AM

I'm also facing the same problem, What is fix here ..

Hi!

As we've already found out by now the only supported way to solve this issue is the removal of the specific hotfixes and the recreation of the profile.

To be honest I am fairly reluctant to start profile deletion sequences for hundreds of users (just think of it before you do: there can be tonns of PST files attached or other custom user configuration that will be lost when creating a new profile).

Messing with the registry and cutting out the bogous MAPI entries are not supported by Microsoft so use the following script with caution and on your own risk.

The sample script below simply deletes the MAPI values with the wrong data and should be run after the patch removal and in the signed in user's context.

It should not do anything on machines that are not having the MAPI corruption.

Please test it before you use it!

Const HKEY_CURRENT_USER = &H80000001

Const REG_SZ = 1
Const REG_EXPAND_SZ = 2
Const REG_BINARY = 3
Const REG_DWORD = 4
Const REG_MULTI_SZ = 7

Const DEBUGGING = false
 
strComputer = "."
 
Set objRegistry = GetObject("winmgmts:\\" & strComputer & "\root\default:StdRegProv")
 
strKeyPath = "Software\Microsoft\Office\15.0\Outlook\Profiles"

strBogousEntry = "001f6641"

objRegistry.EnumKey HKEY_CURRENT_USER, strKeyPath, arrKeyNames

if IsArray(arrKeyNames) then
 
    For i = 0 to UBound(arrKeyNames)

        strText = arrKeyNames(i)  
        
        DebugEcho "DEBUG: Profile name:" & strText

        strSubKey = strKeyPath & "\" & arrKeyNames(i)

        objRegistry.EnumKey HKEY_CURRENT_USER, strSubKey, arrSubKeyNames

        if IsArray(arrSubKeyNames) then
 
            For j = 0 to UBound(arrSubKeyNames)

                strText = arrSubKeyNames(j)  

                DebugEcho "DEBUG: Provider name:" & strText

                strSubSubKey = strSubKey & "\" & arrSubKeyNames(j)

		objRegistry.GetBinaryValue HKEY_CURRENT_USER, strSubSubKey, strBogousEntry, arrOutBytes

		if IsArray(arrOutBytes) then

			intArrSize = UBound(arrOutBytes)

			DebugEcho "DEBUG: Array Size:" & intArrSize

			if intArrSize<12 then

		        	DebugEcho "DEBUG: Proceeding with value deletion:" & strSubSubKey & "\" & strBogousEntry

                		objRegistry.DeleteValue HKEY_CURRENT_USER, strSubSubKey, strBogousEntry

			end if
		
		end if

            Next

        end if
      
    Next

end if

Sub DebugEcho (strOutput)

    If DEBUGGING then

        WScript.Echo strOutput

    end if

End Sub

We also saw this hitting our users. So we placed a call to Microsoft and they came back with this process.

Find and delete the following KB articals;

KB2837618 and KB2885093

The first one is found twice but we did not find the second listed KB#.

Disconnect any .PST archive attached to a users profile after making not of any.

Delete the outlook profile and then restart the computer.

Uncheck any of the above KB articals from being downloaded once again. Restart Outlook. This will rebuild the usres outlook profile. Reattach any .PST. Create a new email and re-select the users signature for new and reply emails.

They are good now. You should see the Free/Busy information.

As of November 29, 2013 Microsoft has still not pulled KB2837618 but yet fully admits that this is a bad security update.

I'm not sure if they will be able to create a Hot Fix for this and the tech we spoke to wasn't sure if this would be forth coming.

Hope this Helps. As a side note: They said this should only affect our Microsoft Outlook 2013 users. I did how-ever see a couple of Outlook 2010 users affected, and just deleteing their outlook profile seems to work just fine without having to kill the bad updates.

As of November 29, 2013 Microsoft has still not pulled KB2837618 but yet fully admits that this is a bad security update.

I'm not sure if they will be able to create a Hot Fix for this and the tech we spoke to wasn't sure if this would be forth coming.

I am dumbfounded at the level of support MS has (not) provided on this issue. They must soon release a fix for this, as going from client to client to uninstall KB's and recreate profiles is simply not an option for many IT departments today. How difficult could it be to reverse the process in another security update or hot fix? If they broke it, they can surely fix it?

I cannot believe that the support rep. said he "wasn't sure if this would be forth coming", regarding a hot fix...

We use Outlook 365 Small Business Premium - which installs a click-to-run version of Outlook 2013...  

We have no access to the various KBs, so can't uninstall the offending patch... Nor does creating a new profile fix the free/busy problem.  So, even though a client-by-client fix is within reason (from a number of clients perspective only!), it doesn't help us.

This has been extremely frustrating!

Still broken after today's updates.

This has been extremely frustrating!

Hello Arnold,

thank you very very much! Tested on three Workstations so far. No need to manually create a new profile.

And "thank you" Microsoft....

• Edited by Codely Friday, January 10, 2014 8:48 PM

There was a patch released to fix this on December 13th.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2837618/
(see under known issues)

Unfortunately it doesn't look like you can avoid deleting the mail profiles, with my small amount of testing it appears an undocumented feature of this patch (2850061) is the deletion of the mail profile during installation.

Also does not appear on the MS update catalogue so cannot be imported into WSUS and will need to be distributed via other methods, although with the mail profile deletion you probably won't want to distribute it at all!

• Proposed as answer by PCAU Monday, January 13, 2014 2:33 AM

Hey Guys,

the new Update is listed:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2850061/en-us

Info:

Issues that this update fixes

• Assume that you use Outlook to connect to a Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 mailbox. Additionally, you installed the Outlook 2013 November 2013 security update. When you try to configure the Automatic Replies (Out of Office) feature, you receive an error message that resembles the following: Your automatic reply settings cannot be displayed because the server is currently unavailable. Try again later. Additionally, you cannot retrieve Free/Busy data for calendar scheduling, and add-ins that use the Account.SmtpAddress property no longer work. This occurs because Autodiscover fails for Exchange 2007 configurations.
• After you install the November 12, 2013 security update for Outlook 2013 or the October 2013 cumulative update, when you start Outlook, Outlook crashes.

Sounds good for me..

cheers...

• Edited by S. Hellmann Wednesday, January 15, 2014 2:41 PM

I wonder if this KB is already included into PKC version of Office 2013. This month a new build came up (15.0.4551.1512). I have tried to update one PC to this version (was 4551.1005 before). Haven't fixed this issue.

I have also updated to this version one test PC, which had 4551.1011 before and on this PC Automatic replies works. But i haven't tried to open Automatic replies before updating on this PC. I'm thinking, maybe your profile gets "corrupted" if you try to open Automatic replies with flawed version of Office so this update is not helping. Might try to rebuilt Outlook profile on the first machine, to see if this helps. Or maybe my second machine never had 1005 build and was updated straight from 1011 to 1512 and that's why it works.

Anyway, it is not a "just works" fix still..

Following the above worked for me.

The only thing different that I had to do was download the 64bit version as I was running Office 2013 64 bit.

Other than that, everything else worked.

Thank you so much for documenting this.

I am still encountering this same issue. I have Win7 systems, Outlook 2013 and Exchange 2010. I have run every suggested fix here and still no go. I have 140+ users, so doing this on individual systems is simply not an options. Has MS come up with a resolution to this issue yet?

Thanks

Heres the page that is the answer for us, if anyone else is interested:http://www.slipstick.com/exchange/cmdlets/out-of-office-doesnt-work-with-exchange-2007-or-2010/

What worked for me was disabling my second network connection. I have a mobile broadband device in my office where my laptop also has a wired connection to the corporate LAN. The laptop also makes a WiFi connection to the mobile broadband device, but uses the wired connection for default communication. Beginning about two weeks ago after some updates, I was unable to access free/busy information or connect to Lync meetings. After disabling the WiFi adapter, free/busy worked and Lync.

Unfortunately, I spent considerable time trying most of the other solutions proposed here and resorted to a completely fresh install of Windows before coming across this simple solution.

• Proposed as answer by ReversePsychBob 16 hours 56 minutes ago