Catching Up After the Microsoft 365 Outage

If you kept checking Outlook on Thursday or Friday, hoping it would finally connect, you weren’t alone. The Microsoft 365 outage that started on November 12 disrupted work around the world. Microsoft reported services restored on November 14, and its public status page shows products operating normally again. Associated Press, Microsoft service status

Getting your inbox back is a relief. Catching up is another matter. You still need to work out which messages went through, who’s waiting for a reply, and whether anything important got missed.

Microsoft says the problem began with an earlier network capacity upgrade and surfaced after a later network change. The company said it was a technical issue unrelated to cyberattacks or AI agents. It brought services back gradually, checking that they stayed stable along the way. Microsoft’s statement

Microsoft has promised a fuller report once its review is complete. In the meantime, there are a few things businesses can check themselves—and one that’s easy to overlook is the website.

Your website might have worked perfectly throughout the outage. Customers could browse your services and fill in your contact form as usual. But that doesn’t necessarily mean the notification emails reached your team.

Depending on how the form is built, an enquiry might be saved on the website before an email is sent. If so, you have somewhere to check for anything missing. If the email itself is the only record, tracking down an enquiry can be harder.

It’s worth taking a few minutes to find out how your form works. Where do submissions go? Who receives them? Is there a record you can check if an email doesn’t arrive?

You don’t need to know the technical details yourself. Your website provider should be able to explain the setup and help you check it.

For now, start with the conversations that matter most. Look for messages still sitting in your Outbox or delivery failure notices. Follow up on urgent enquiries and confirm any appointments or approvals that were left hanging. Where your website stores submissions, compare those records with the emails you received.

Before sending everything again, check what actually arrived. Duplicate messages can add to the confusion, especially when they involve orders, bookings, or payment instructions.

If you’re still having trouble with Microsoft 365, ask your administrator to check Health → Service health in the admin centre. That’s where they can find information relevant to your organisation and report any remaining problems. Microsoft’s guidance

Once you’ve caught up, have a quick conversation with your team about what would have helped. Perhaps someone needed a customer’s phone number but could only find it in Outlook. Perhaps nobody knew which number to call when email was down. Small changes like keeping essential contacts somewhere accessible can make the next interruption easier to handle.

Our advice at EKAPPS is to take a little time to check for anything that might have slipped through. If your website saves enquiries, compare those records with your inbox and follow up with anyone still waiting for a reply.

And if you’re not sure whether your website saves those enquiries, you can reach us through our Contact Us page. We’re happy to help you figure it out.