How to Turn Off Outlook Calendar's Overzealous TimeZone Feature on Windows Phone and Windows 8

[coip]

I use Outlook's calendar on all my devices: via Outlook 2013 on my PC, via the Calendar app on my Surface RT, and via the Calendar app on my Windows Phone 8. I love how it syncs across all my devices, but I have a big problem that has caused me to miss meetings, and that is the auto-timezone correct feature. For instance, if I'm in Denver on business and I have a meeting that is scheduled that day for a month or two in advance in Chicago, if I enter the meeting on my phone as 2:00pm on January 20th, my phone thinks that's 3:00pm Mountain time. Then, when I go to Chicago on January 20th, my phone updates and changes the meeting time on my calendar to 3:00pm (as 2:00pm Mountain time is 3:00pm Central time). Or, it will just automatically show up as 3:00pm on my other devices, making me think the meeting is at 3:00. Thus, I show up an hour late and look like an inconsiderate doofus. When you have a lot of meetings going on that you schedule months in advance, this can be really bad.

Is there a way to just turn off this time zone feature in all versions, on all devices, in some global settings feature tied to my Microsoft account? I think I tried to do it manually once, but I might have reset my Surface and then it defaulted back. It's a pain in the neck trying to remember the settings of a numerous devices. I just want it to trust me that I know what time I wanted to put in and I don't want it to change the time on me.

 

[Guzzler3]

Wow,

I just ran into similar issue. I recently reset my phone and forgot to set it to the proper time zone (it defaulted to Mountain, when I'm in AZ with no DST). Later I realized it was off, put it back to the proper time zone and it went nuts on all my appointments. I had to use Outlook Desktop to fix everything (it as the quickest way to fix everything).

So, sorry but I have no clue for a suggestion.

 

[iradeut]

I've encountered this issue on every device and every calendar program I've ever used. The purpose is to deal with things like conference call invitations, where people in several time zones are sent an invite, and it goes into each of their calendars in the correct time zone. The so-called "correct" way of entering appointments when you will be traveling, is to set the time zone on the appointment to the destination time zone in advance. It is then correct when you arrive. I don't know anyone who works this way, so the whole thing is ridiculous for any portable device. I seem to recall that some Android devices had a setting that simply said "do not change the times on appointments when traveling" or something like that. Its a simple solution that should be available on all devices.

 

[coip]

Just wanted to let you all know that I spent about 1 hour with Office 365 tech support on the issue and they couldn't help at all. I think the easiest way to get around it is to not use the time feature but just put the time generically in the title. For instance, for the title type: "2pm, meeting with Jane". Instead of typing "Meeting with Jane" and then selecting the time as "2:00pm". The only problem with that is that it will then deem the meeting an "all-day event" and it'll dominate the calendar all day long.

 

[iradeut]

My solution is that I set my phone to stay on my home time zone. The time on the phone is wrong, but the appointments are correct. I use my watch, rather than the phone to tell what time it is.

 

[11B1P]

This is a huge failure on MS. If they expect to continue to market this OS to the business sector, this needs to be corrected immediately. Thankfully I only travel to other time zones on vacation.

 

[manicottiK]

I'm confused by the confusion.

Let's say that live and work in NYC. During a trip to LA, I decide to schedule a conference call meeting for Monday, December 2 for 2pm EST. Some of the participants will be in NY and some in LA. Since I'd be in LA at the time that I'm setting up the meeting, I'd key it in as 11am since that's when it will be for people in the time zone that I'm working from as I enter the appointment. The east coast folks will see it as a 2pm meeting. If we later add someone in Chicago, they'll see 1pm.

If the confusion is about why the current time zone is a factor at all, the answer is that the time zone is a factor so that offsets can be properly computed for other users. Just listing a time (i.e., 2pm) isn't enough to specify when a meeting is unless one also knows the time zone (and applicability of daylight saving time). This is exactly how it is on your computer, except that your computer doesn't typically know its position so it doesn't typically adjust its time zone for local time, as your phone does.

If the confusion is about why Microsoft didn't provide Windows Phone with the ability to let users specify a time zone along with an appointment, we'll just have to assume that they left it out to reduce complexity. I wish that they'd add it in because it would make cross-timeone and out-of-home appointments easier to enter. As it is, I usually key in cross-time zone meetings from Outlook directly to avoid the confusion.

I recently traveled from PHL-LAX-AKL-BNE and back; I did it across the end of DST in the States. My appointments where scattered across the International Date Line and multiple DST settings: I left the U.S. during DST, entered New Zealand during their DST, went to Queensland (where, like Arizona, they don't observe DST even though the rest of Australia does), and returned home to standard time. All of my flight times and meetings were correct because they where keyed in to desktop Outlook with time zone offsets. If I had ignored those offsets, I'd have missed planes and even been at the airport on the wrong days.

 

[iradeut]

I completely understand how the time zones are supposed to work, but the system was created before everyone was carrying around mobile devices. If I'm going to be in Los Angeles for a day, and the calendar changes the times of every appointment to adjust for the new time zone, that means if I look ahead to the next day, I'm not seeing the correct times for future appointments when I return to my home time zone. As I said in my previous post, there should be a way to turn off this feature by device.

 

[coip]

Indeed, I see the merits of the system as is, but it's true that people carrying around cell phones has really bungled it up. So, if I'm reading you correctly, the solution is to only use Outlook 2013 on the PC to put in appointment times. However, this isn't really feasible. Often I'll be meeting up with people unofficially and then they'll propose a meeting: I whip out my phone and type it in the built-in Calendar there.

As a side note of complaint about the built-in Calendar on Windows Phone, if I'm in 'month mode' view, why can't I pinch to zoom? Instead I have to individually select a day. Whereas it would be nice to zoom in a bit to get a multi-day view but in calendar format. Once I was so annoyed that I couldn't zoom in that I took a screenshot of the calendar and then zoomed in on it there. What did I find? I found that all the previously illegible things listed that I couldn't read in the "month mode" view where now legible, but they were written in a different language. Anybody know what this stuff means because this is what is written on my Windows Phone calendar in 'month view' mode:
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[neo158]

Indeed, I see the merits of the system as is, but it's true that people carrying around cell phones has really bungled it up. So, if I'm reading you correctly, the solution is to only use Outlook 2013 on the PC to put in appointment times. However, this isn't really feasible. Often I'll be meeting up with people unofficially and then they'll propose a meeting: I whip out my phone and type it in the built-in Calendar there.

As a side note of complaint about the built-in Calendar on Windows Phone, if I'm in 'month mode' view, why can't I pinch to zoom? Instead I have to individually select a day. Whereas it would be nice to zoom in a bit to get a multi-day view but in calendar format. Once I was so annoyed that I couldn't zoom in that I took a screenshot of the calendar and then zoomed in on it there. What did I find? I found that all the previously illegible things listed that I couldn't read in the "month mode" view where now legible, but they were written in a different language. Anybody know what this stuff means because this is what is written on my Windows Phone calendar in 'month view' mode:
Nam nec vulputate
Egestas nisi quis
Laecenas sem mattis

The writing is Latin I believe. Before I hear the "But it should be showing my appointment" complaints about it again, you aren't supposed to be looking at your appointments in that view anyway it's just placeholder text to show that you have one or more appointments that day. Pinch to Zoom might be nice but considering you can scroll through all appointments in agenda view it make pinch to zoom in month view redundant.

 

[MKairys]

Get Simple Calendar which shows your actual appointment text in month view.

 

[Janda45]

I usually calendar in Outlook and sync to OL.com. I have to learn to use the time zone feature when scheduling appointments and all should be well!

 

[forked]

The problem is that you are not taking the time to enter the meeting properly for your time zone (or whatever time zone is current for your phone at the time) If you are in Denver and you know you have meeting in Chicago at 2pm on a particular date, you enter it as being at 3pm because, in Denver, it would be at 3pm. Then when you go to Chicago, the phone will show the meeting as being at 2pm.


Suppose you don't do that and you end not being able to travel for whatever reason and you have to do a teleconference instead, using your method (ie entering the time of the meeting without regard to where the meeting is occurring) you will end up an hour off because even though it was at 2pm, you're still in Denver and the meeting is really happening at 3pm in Denver not 2pm




TLDR: Take the time zone into account when scheduling the meeting and you won't have this problem.

 

[Jerry Gamble]

This is a problem that's been bugging me for years & finally managed to crack it last night.

Previously, despite WLM being set to the correct time zone for me, all alerts got sent according to Microsoft time (something like 9 hours behind).

Eventually I found the solution. So simple it's infuriating.

1. Set WLM Time Zones as per normal.
2. Login to Outlook.com, go to Calendar & set the Time Zones there as well.

Sorted.

 

[mullern]

I also struggle with the fact that a time zone change changes the appointment times. I would wish tio have back the solution we did have in the good old Palm Treo phones where we could specify whether a time zone change affects calendar times or not.
For the time being, what I do if I travel from one time zone to another is to switch of all automatic time allocation (time zone and date&time) and after that change the time (and the date if needed) manually. Then I leave all on manual until I am back in my home time zone.