Microsoft is giving its commercial customers who are using older versions of Outlook 2 months to upgrade before losing access to its 365 and Office 365 services.

Are you a Microsoft user? If so, have you checked if your Microsoft programs are up to date? If you haven’t yet, then now’s the perfect time to do so. Or else, your personal files could be at risk.

The commercial customers have been given a reminder to upgrade within two months, otherwise they would get cut off from Microsoft’s services.

“After November 1, 2021, only Outlook 2013 Service Pack 1 (with latest fixes) and later will be able to connect to Microsoft 365 services,” the company noted in their blog on August 27.

Microsoft stopped supporting its older versions of Office last year. Rather, connecting it to its online services like Exchange Online as of October 13, 2020. The following editions of Office were greatly affected–Office 2007, Office 2010, and Office 2013.

Office 2007 has already been removed from all support, whereas Office 2010 is subject to exit the support on the same October 13 date. Office 2013, on the other hand, will remain in support until April of 2023.

The shutdown of the service has already been set in stone way back in 2017.

At the moment, Microsoft kindheartedly gave a grace period for their users. Saying that even though the support would be completely terminated, it doesn’t necessarily mean the end of connectivity.

“We won’t take any active measures to block other versions of the Office client, such as Office 2013, from connecting to Office 365 services, but these older clients may encounter performance or reliability issues over time,” the developer of Microsoft said back then.

This means that you are free to use older existing versions of Microsoft Office, but since it will no longer be supported, then you have to expect that there will be certain issues that might arise in the long run.

The difference between back then and now is that Microsoft is no longer being lenient with their deadline. The cut-off date at November 1 will really drop older Outlook clients from Microsoft’s services. This means there won’t be any grace period this time around. It’s time to mark your calendars to make sure you’ve gotten your application updated by that time already.

Microsoft firmly explained that the older Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 programs used by clients will no longer be compatible with the two upcoming changes to the services. This includes an end to the support for Basic Authentication.

The Basic Authentication feature is essentially the long-standard username and password combination. This means that it uses a username and a password for client access requests. This was previously postponed in February 2021.

However, Microsoft didn’t explicitly say when exactly would the Basic Auth feature get dropped. So, there isn’t a specific date for that yet.

You need to definitely check the current version of your Outlook and see whether or not you need to update the program. It’s better to do this as soon as possible so that you won’t have any irretrievable files and there wouldn’t be any compatibility issues.

Switching to the latest subscription model of Office 365 or Microsoft 365 is highly recommended because it provides the always up-to-date client software. This will save you from any headaches in the future as well, so that you won’t run into technical issues.

The good news is, being able to update your Outlook application doesn’t take that much skill. You can manually check for and apply any updates in your Outlook program by doing the following:

1. Open your Microsoft Outlook application and click on “File.”
2. In the navigation panel, click on “Office Account.”
3. You will see a button named “Update Options”, you must click on it.
4. Click on the “Update Now” button.

And there you have it, four simple steps on how to see if your Outlook program is up to date or not.

If you need any more help with accessing your data and updating your software, our team of experts here at WestTech Technologies will be happy to resolve this issue for you. With our competitive prices and state-of-the-art services, your worries of Microsoft cutting you off will disappear.

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