Quick VBA script: Attachment reminder for Outlook

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Many of us have at one time or another composed an e-mail in Outlook in which we've said "I've attached the file you wanted," hit Send -- and then realized that we never attached the file. Oops!

K.C. Lemson has created a quick Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) script that helps prevent this from happening.

When a message is sent, it checks the body of the message for the word "attach" (either in whole or in part). If there's no attachment, a pop-up dialog box will appear to warn you that there's no attachment in the message.

I have modified the original script slightly so that the check for the word "attach" is case-insensitive, in case you start a sentence with the word (i.e., "Attached is the file you asked for…").

Note that to create the script, you need to first enable macros in Outlook (which is disabled by default for security reasons).

About the author: Serdar Yegulalp

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is editor of the Windows Power Users Newsletter.

This is a very useful tip, but can you explain why I get a pop-up message each time the script is executed? It asks me if I want to allow the program access. Is there some way of turning this off?
—Simon P.

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This warning comes up in different contexts depending on how Outlook is set to run scripts. If you just want to be warned once when you start Outlook, go to Tools -> Macros -> Security and select the "Medium" option (this is part of the instructions in the script).

If you're using something other than Outlook 2003 (which is what I composed the tip with), you might get slightly different behaviors.
—Serdar Yegulalp, tip author

Reference Center: Microsoft Outlook tips and resources

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