Dissapearing Email with iPad 2

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Dissapearing Email with iPad 2

Have several of our company's officers with iPad 2 (Version 5.1.1 on all). The iPads sync up with an Exchange 2010 sp1 server for email. What the users see is the email comes in and after a few moments, the emails that have come in will dissappear. They then can no longer be found on either the iPad or in Outlook (v2010) in any folder or deleted items.

I have searched the forums and have run across many people with the same issue, but so far no solutions that have worked for us. On the iPads, the "Mail Days to Sync" are set to No Limit. The Outlook client is using an OST file instead of PST, and going through the settings it's not set up to take emails off the server. I know it's not a deleting issue since we have the Exchange server itself limiting the user from "true" deletions. I have found 1 of the 3 users that is experiencing this problem also have an iPhone 4 (also version 5.1.1). However when he has his iPad with him, email for the Exchange account is turned off.

This does not happen every time but quite randomly and without any rhyme or reason that I can determine. I have actually witnessed the emails come in and then *poof*, are gone. Exchange accounts do not have rules set up and archive is set to only archive items older than 6 months. I have contacted Apple support and they were "less" than knowlegeable and even stated that "this is not a known issue" despite several posts and hence would not help unless we paid for support (obviously).

I hope someone has some type of solution or something that I can take a look at to see if there is a setting or something that I am missing. For all I can tell, it should be working as it's supposed to. I can scratch out Exchange since the only users affected are the ones using iPads. I can provide any other details if needed.

Thanks

Dave

iPad 2, iOS 5.1.1, Disappearing emails

Posted on May 23, 2012 9:27 AM

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Answer 1

May 23, 2012 1:34 PM in response to Boyettdh

Dumb question, have you tried removing the email account from one of the devices and re-add it to see if the issues still happens? Are the accounts using ActiveSync or are they using some sort of IMAP or POP3 account setup instead? If they are using ActiveSync you may want to create a new test policy and add a user or 2 to that group to see if the same issue occurs. Are these the only users in the company using iOS devices or do any users have email sync to an iPhone that works fine? I'm running both and iPhone 4 and iPad 1 with 5.1.1 and don't see any issues but as we know what works for 1 never works for everyone.

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Answer 2

Boyettdh Author

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May 23, 2012 2:05 PM in response to MessagingTech

We have tried removing the accounts and readding them. The devices are using Exchanges ActiveSync. As far as users that we know of, if they have just the iPhone, there has been no reports of missing email (myself included iPhone 3). I don't know if having the iPhone and iPad at the same time is doing anything or not. My assumption is not since the person I was checking out today turns off the mail on his iPhone unless he doesn't have his iPad with him.

The frustrating thing is I can't find a "triggering event" that seems to cause this.

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Answer 3

May 25, 2012 6:23 AM in response to Boyettdh

Have you tried creating a new test user and set their account up on one of the iPads or any user relatively new to the organization? Are all the users having the problem on the same database or mail server? I've seen on some other forums that if you move a user from 1 database to another that corrects some issues as well. Wondering if it's a policy somewhere being applied just to a group of users that all of these users are apart of?

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Answer 4

Boyettdh Author

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May 25, 2012 9:47 AM in response to MessagingTech

See what we can do with a test user and find out what that reveals. We're not so large a company to have a need of multiple databases, especially with our setup. So we only have the single Exchange database.

I can't see if it's a policy, or what policy would affect it. If it was policy related I would think I would see this happening more often and across the board. Are there particular policies I should look at? The only ones we have in place affecting mail accounts are quotas, which neither is coming close to, and cleaning trash. But items aren't deleted completely from trash until it's been through a backup, i.e., it may look like it's removed from the users trash folder, but it doesn't remove it from the server till later.

My only suspicion is that somewhere there is a mail application that is doing a pull on the mail and taking it off the server. However I can't find anything and it doesn't look like Outlook or the iPad/iPhone is setup to do that.

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Answer 5

May 27, 2012 12:01 AM in response to Boyettdh

Shame on me...i upgraded today my iPad 3 and 4S to 5.1.1 and like you my Gmail Box configured as Exchange for Push, is completely broken :|

I can't read my calendars, can't update my contact list and also my email are not downloaded.

This is completely ridicuolous because i also tried to remove the account and restore the devices...nothing worked 😟

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Answer 6

May 27, 2012 11:11 AM in response to Matthias46

Hi Mathias 46: I use a different email client, but had a similar problem. Anything in a folder that I created, as opposed to the ones that the client provides, disappeared when I checked my mail on my iPad. It wasn't like I actually went to those folders, though. Check your mail settings. There's a box you can click that says something like "always ask before downloading." When I clicked that the problem was fixed. According to the tech support for my email, in theory the mail should be on my iPad, but it isn't. Check Goodle tech support, they may know more.

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