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Over the last two years, I have been using Outlook 2013, now Office 365. I've been experiencing an ongoing issue where I receive this message "Operation cannot be performed because message has been changed" message. Typical scenarios: 1) A new email arrives in my Outlook inbox. I preview, or read the email. I attempt to delete the email. Operation cannot... message appears. I either type a new email, or reply to an email, go on to another task leaving the draft until later. When I return to the draft email, complete the email, and attempt to send the email, Operation cannot... message appears. I also cannot even save the draft, same error message. This is the worst part of this bug, as I've wasted/lost the time effort spent on the draft email.
I have run the Office repair utilities. I have tried unchecking the email cleanup boxes, and a variety of fixes recommended on these Microsoft answers communities. I've noticed sometimes when I come back to a message, it does allow me to move/delete the message. It's like there's a sync issue that needs time to resolve. However, nothing appears to work when a draft message gets hung in this loop. I have to start over with a new reply email.
Using Classic Outlook on Windows for personal email, calendar, and contact management
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When you get this error if you select an other folder, then go back to the original is the problem replicated
Hi KeithLwood,
Thank you for the detail issue description.
May I first confirm with you if you are using Gmail account at outlook client or you are using Office365 account with its mailbox, it will be great if you tell us your account type.
Since you have already did almost all the troubleshooting steps, regarding with the clean up boxes, can I ask if you did this as well?
Open Outlook > File > Options > Mail > Under Conversation Clean up, Uncheck When a reply modifies a message, don't move the original > Restart Outlook (it is is already unchecked, check it Restart Outlook, Uncheck it and Restart Outlook)
Also, try to Account Settings > Open your account > More settings > Under Advanced tab, put INBOX in Root Folder Path. (If your all folders disappear, simply remove INBOX from here)
Last, we would like you to create a new profile, navigate to control panel, Mail, and create a new one for your convience:
Let me know if the above steps work to some extent, apprecaite it.
Kind Regards,
George
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This works on about half the messages.
Company has G Suite, so Google/Gmail hosts our email. I was using Office 2013 up until last week, now using Office 365.
The conversation clean up check box you referenced was unchecked. I've tried that before. I've also tried creating a new profile. Same result. I have not tried moving my inbox to the Root Folder Path because I don't fully understand these instructions: (If your all folders disappear, simply remove INBOX from here)