Annoying password loss in Outlook 2011 for Mac

Following the release of OS X Mavericks, some applications manifested odd behaviour. Outlook for Mac 2011 is one such app!

This generally occurs when the development team behind the app don’t release updates to allow the app to work in the new OS environment.

At present Outlook 2011 for Mac seems to (occasionally) forget passwords stored, particularly for Exchange and IMAP accounts. This results in the user receiving an incorrect password (or forgot password) error.

This is how to solve it:

1. Open Outlook.
2. Then, use Finder to select the Applications folder, then the Microsoft Office folder.
3. Holding the Control key down, select the Outlook “O” icon, and select “Get Info” from the list.
4. Once open check the “Prevent Nap App” box.
5. Then close Finder, quit Outlook and then re-open it.

This action prevents  Outlook sleeping in Mavericks. This control  was designed to improve power consumption, however the Outlook app wasn’t modified to conform to this new feature. This workaround applies the fix and solves the password issue.

It’s possible that in a future update Microsoft will release a complete fix.