Contacts problem

[embwbafpm]

I'm using Outlook 2003 at work, via an exchange server - meaning I have
no access to or control of the settings on the server side.

I have an extensive contacts list, that I use all the time. I have
cleaned all the entries by exporting to a CSV, making sure firstnames
are in firstname columns, etc, and then re-importing. When I look at my
contacts list, it does exactly what I want - they are listed lastname,
firstname, with the full name being shown firstname lastname. It
functions exactly as desired when I go through my contacts. (I'm
explicit here because I've had about 10 people tell me to change the
contact list display option to lastname, firstname - which it already
was and did correctly - because they didn't clearly understand my
problem).

Now, the problem: when I write an email, and then click on the "to"
button to select the recipients, it goes to my contact list exactly as
desired, but everyone is listed by firstname lastname. It is driving me
crazy, because I don't always know their first names, and the focus
blocking will force me to save the email, close it, open my contact
list, look them up to find their first name, go back to the email, and
find them via their first name.

Possibly related additional (but much less annoying) problem: when I
click the "to:" button to select recipients for an email, it sometimes
lists the same person twice - one line for their email, and one for the
phone number. I say sometimes, because I haven't been able to discern a
pattern, and as I said before, I exported my contacts and cleaned up
the CSV file, deleted my contacts, and imported the CSV file back in,
so I don't think any of the data is any different.

Anyone have any ideas?

 

[Vince Averello [MVP-Outlook]]

See what the setting here is: Tools menu > Email accounts > View/Change
existing address books/directories > Click Next > Highlight Outlook Address
Book > Click Change. There should be a sort order option

 

[Peter Marchert]

Hello,

please set the option "Tools", "E-mail Accounts", "View or change
existing directories or address books", "Change..." to "File As".

The double entries in the address books are faxnumbers of your
contacts. If you don`t want to fax with Outlook you can move them to a
phone number field or to set some characters in front of the fax number
field (e. g. "fax: +49 (89) 12345678").

To chnage all contacts you can use the ex- and import funciton to excel
and rename the fax number column into a phone number colum or to add
"fax" to all numbers.

Peter