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Wrong date format in email notiifcations despite settings

The date format is set to DD-MM-YYYY in my preferences, but Dropbox emails are arrving in a completely different format with the month and day inverted.

I know MM-DD-YYY is used in the US, but in the UK and Europe this is incorrect for numerical dates, and when it's not obvious that the day couldn't also be a month (e.g. 03/31/2023), the problem isn't always detectable and can cause problems (meeting dates is the common issue). When reading the email below, I actually assumed Dropbox was informing me about outdated changes from Jan/Feb and that my desktop app had some kind of sync problem.

Regarding what solutions I've tried from similar threads: my Dropbox language is 'non-US' English, my timezone is the one for London, my computer's region is set to UK, and its timezone is also for London. I've also cleared my browser cache etc etc, but doubt any of this will affect how Dropbox notification emails are being sent. So has anyone got any other suggestions? Will try anything at this point.

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Eildh

Hi, sorry for the delay~

I travelled for work and had no internet access so didn't change the date format, but on return, I found that incoming Dropbox notification emails are now showing the correct date format for all shared folders, including the one in the initial post. So basically I've done nothing and it seems to have sorted itself out (somehow)... 😕

All comments

Walter

Hey @Eildh, thanks for posting on our Community and happy Friday.

May I ask if this happens with all of the email notifications you get about the activity in your shared folders?

Also, are those folders owned by you or someone else?

Any additional information is more than welcome!

Eildh

Afraid I don't have recent emails for other folders, but this particular folder is owned by another user and I've no idea what date format they use. I assume this is the likely issue?

Jay

Hi @Eildh, could you try switching your date to another format, like YYYY - MM - DD, leave it like that for a few seconds, and then switch it back to DD/MM/YY and let us know how it goes the next time you get an email?

Eildh

Hi, sorry for the delay~

Hannah

Hey @Eildh, thanks for the update here.

I'm happy to see that the issue resolved itself, but if you come across it again, do let us know.

Thanks and have a great day!