The problem with winmail.dat file, and how to fix it.

Email users sometimes find that they receive email messages with a strange file attached, called winmail.dat. When they attempt to open this file, either it can't be opened at all, or it contains "garbage" data. The cause of this problem is when people use Microsoft Outlook (Not Microsoft Outlook Express). Unfortunately, Outlook does not "play nice" with the other email programs all the time. Outlook will change outgoing email attachments into a file called winmail.dat, which other Outlook users can read but no other email program can. This causes problems, not for the sender of the email, but the recipient, particularly when important files are attached to messages.
For more information visit this page from Microsoft.

This also causes big problems when our customers using Outlook try to send an email fax to our system. Our System can not read the winamil.dat file and they will get a reply error email.

The Solution

To fix this problem just follow the simple directions below.

1. Open up Outlook, click on the 'Tools' menu > click 'Options...'

2. In the Options window, click on the 'Mail Format' tab. Where it says
       "Compose in this message format:" choose 'Plain Text'

3. Click 'Apply'. Click 'OK'.

This causes Outlook to send attachments in their normal format instead of changing them into a winmail.dat file, eliminating the problem.

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