Is there an ID field you can use to pair a reply to the sent email?

[accessDatabase]

Hi all,

Is there a field within an Outlook mailItem which allows you to store an ID number e.g. 123456 which you can read from their reply email?
I am trying to insert a contactId somewhere in the email which I can read when the person replies and use to make updates to an Access database. I would rather not have to show the contactId in the body of the email. I tried using the 'mileage' field but it came back empty in the reply.

I have tried to capture conversationID from the last sent message in the sent folder and then pair it with the conversationID of the reply email but they don't match up.

The code I used to get the conversationID of the last sent message in the sent folder is:

Dim ns As NameSpace
Dim f As Folder
Dim items As items


Dim mailSent As MailItem

Set ns = Application.Session
Set f = ns.GetDefaultFolder(olFolderSentMail)
Set items = f.items

items.Sort "SentOn", False
Set mailSent = items.Item(items.Count)
Debug.Print mailSent.Subject
Debug.Print "last mail sent: " & mailSent.ConversationID

The code I used to get the conversationID from the reply email is:

Dim oApp As Outlook.Application
Set oApp = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")
Dim oMail As Outlook.MailItem
Set oMail = oApp.ActiveExplorer.Selection.Item(1)

Debug.Print oMail.ConversationID

Thanks!

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Do you want to add a contactid field to the message that matches a contact? If you want to use a unique code that is in the message, the entryid would work.

You can't replace a field that already exists but can add a custom field.

 

[accessDatabase]

Hi Diane, thanks for your reply.
I tried the Entry ID but that didn't match between the sent and reply emails unfortunately.
I tried your custom field idea but have come up against an error.

I have two buttons in the Outlook ribbon: the first one sends the email with this code:

Dim oApp As Outlook.Application
Dim oMail As Outlook.MailItem
Dim UserProp As Outlook.UserDefinedProperty
Set oApp = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")

Set oMail = oApp.CreateItem(olMailItem)
oMail.Display
oMail.To = "franc@workingdata.co.uk"
oMail.Mileage = 1234567890
oMail.Subject = "Unsubscribe"
oMail.UserProperties.Add("contactId", olNumber) = 1234567890
oMail.Save
oMail.Send

I received the email from Outlook to another email address for which I use Thunderbird. I reply with a few words and send the email back. I then try to read the 'contactId' field from the reply email using your code (slightly amended):

Dim UserProp As Outlook.UserDefinedProperty
Dim obj As Object
Dim contactId As Long

Set obj = Application.ActiveExplorer.Selection.Item(1)

On Error Resume Next
Set UserProp = obj.UserProperties.Find("contactId")
If Not UserProp Is Nothing Then
contactId = obj.UserProperties("contactId").Value
MsgBox strCurrent
Else
MsgBox "Field not found"
End If

Set obj = Nothing

End Sub

This brings up the messagebox 'Field not found'. I'm sure I've spelt the custom field the same way in both subs. Any ideas?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Ah yeah, the custom field is not sent with the message.

The thread index in the header should work - as long as the sending server doesn't strip it out.

Original from client:
Thread-Index: AdbFGPx6nS1EldD1QR+/viR5PfRk7QCIIw9A

My message to him does not have a thread id (or a header)
But the reply back has this - using just the first 10 or 20 characters should work.
Thread-Index: AdbFGPx6nS1EldD1QR+/viR5PfRk7QCIIw9AAAimK3AAAdIzAA==

 

[accessDatabase]

Hi Diane, I couldn't find 'Thread-Index' as an option for an olMailItem.

When I tried Conversation Index there wasn't the similarity that you showed in your example. How do email clients know how to put together emails into conversation threads? Is that what I'm missing?