Tip 1050: Translation Error importing CSV file

I'm seeing a lot of complaints that contacts exported from Outlook.com or Hotmail accounts won't import into Outlook.

Instead, the user receives a Translation Error message reporting that a file error occurred in the translator.

A file error has occurred in the Comma Separated Values translator while initializing a translator to build a field map.
Outlook was unable to retrieve the data from the file "C:\Downloads\WLMContacts.csv". Verify that you have the correct file, that you have permission to open it, and that it is not open in another program.

This is the result of the exported file's Unicode encoding. When the CSV file is opened in Excel, all of the comma-separated fields are in one cell, not one cell per field. Excel can't detect the field separators and neither can Outlook.

Note: this error is not limited to CSV files exported from Outlook.com or Hotmail. Other CSV files may result in the same error message. This solution will work for those files as well.

Solution

Save the CSV with ANSI format selected.

To do this, open the CSV file in Notepad and use File, Save as, selecting ANSI from the Encoding dropdown and Save using the existing file name. (To open the CSV in Notepad, right click on the CSV and choose Open with.... Select Notepad. Or open Notepad and drag the CSV to it.)

Published on December 24, 2012

Related posts:

We’re seeing more complaints that Outlook reports this error: “Outlook could not create the work file. Check tTip 677: Error: Can’t create work file Are you using Word as your e-mail editor and get a message that says something like this: "Word is unavaiTip 403: 'Word is Unavailable' Error I’ve had a few questions about Outlook 2003 on Windows 7 that result in an Agent error: “The Office Assistant Tip 704: Office Assistant Error in Windows 7 Tip 973: Outlook continues to access a folder after attaching a file to an email Windows default behavior of hiding file extensions seems to confuse some users when they try to save an attachTip 490: Save... File Extensions Tip 1015: Outlook 2013 and the annoying Gmail IMAP error

This article is filed under Tips Archive.
Last reviewed on Dec 24, 2012