Killing Overdue Reminders in Outlook

I’ve seen several tweets lately like these two from TornadoTwins and seanblezard (respectively).

I really don’t see any reason for #Microsoft #Outlook to remind you of meetings in the past. Boy is this piece of software a mess.

Why the hell is my work Outlook calendar reminding me about meetings that are 110 weeks overdue!

They make a good point. What’s the value in Outlook reminding you about something that occurs in the past? Especially if the appointment occurred 110 weeks (more than two years) ago. I can see where that’d be annoying.

Scripting to the rescue. While Outlook lacks a built-in setting that eliminates past due reminders, it’s very simple to script their elimination. Here’s the code for doing that. This code is designed to run each time you launch Outlook. All it does is go through the existing reminders and compare the current date/time to the date/time set in the reminder. If the current date/time is greater, then the reminder occurs in the past and the code dismisses it. This does introduce a risk that you’ll miss a reminder that was set to go off just before you launched Outlook. For example, you had a reminder set to go off at 8:45 for a 9:00 meeting. You launch Outlook at 8:50. The code cancels the reminder and you miss the appointment because you launched Outlook five minutes too late. To prevent that from happening I’ve given you the option to set a grace period to honor reminders with a set number of minutes of Outlook launching. By default the grace period is 60 minutes. That is, any reminder that would have occurred within 60 minutes of Outlook launching won’t be cancelled. If 60 minutes is too long, or not long enough, then you can change the grace period to whatever you want it to be. Just remember the grace period is in minutes.

Instructions.

Outlook 2003 and Earlier.

1. Start Outlook
2. Click Tools > Macro > Visual Basic Editor
3. If not already expanded, expand Microsoft Office Outlook Objects and click on ThisOutlookSession
4. Copy the code from the Code Snippet box and paste it into the right-hand pane of
5. Outlook’s VB Editor window
6. Edit the code as needed. I included comment lines wherever something needs to or can change
7. Click the diskette icon on the toolbar to save the changes
8. Close the VB Editor
9. Click Tools > Macro > Security
10. Set the Security Level to Medium
11. Close Outlook
12. Start Outlook
13. Outlook will display a dialog-box warning that ThisOutlookSession contains macros and asking if you want to allow them to run. Say yes.

Outlook 2007.

1. Start Outlook
2. Click Tools > Macro > Visual Basic Editor
3. If not already expanded, expand Microsoft Office Outlook Objects and click on ThisOutlookSession
4. Copy the code from the Code Snippet box and paste it into the right-hand pane of Outlook’s VB Editor window
5. Edit the code as needed. I included comment lines wherever something needs to or can change
6. Click the diskette icon on the toolbar to save the changes
7. Close the VB Editor
8. Click Tools > Trust Center
9. Click Macro Security
10. Set Macro Security to “Warnings for all macros”
11. Click OK
12. Close Outlook
13. Start Outlook. Outlook will display a dialog-box warning that ThisOutlookSession contains macros and asking if you want to allow them to run. Say yes.

Private Sub Application_Startup()
    KillOverdueReminders
End Sub

Sub KillOverdueReminders()
    ' Purpose: Kills all reminders for past due appointments.'
    ' Usage:   Run at Outlook startup to eliminate reminders on appointments that occur in the past.'
    ' Written: 4/1/2011'
    ' Modified: 11/30/2011'
    ' Author:  David Lee'
    ' Outlook: All versions'
    Const GRACE_PERIOD_MINUTES = 60
    Dim olkReminders As Outlook.Reminders, olkReminder As Outlook.Reminder, intCount As Integer, intIndex As Integer
    Set olkReminders = Application.Reminders
    intCount = olkReminders.Count
    For intIndex = intCount To 1 Step -1
        Set olkReminder = olkReminders.Item(intIndex)
        If olkReminder.Item.Class = olAppointment Then
            If DateAdd("n", GRACE_PERIOD_MINUTES * -1, Now) > olkReminder.NextReminderDate Then
                olkReminders.Remove intIndex
            End If
        End If
    Next
    Set olkReminder = Nothing
End Sub