A user needed to send personalized emails where each recipient receives a custom PDF generated from a Word template and Excel data. The original Outlook automation path failed on the client PC, even though PDF generation worked fine.

FabNinjas built a Word VBA automation tool that reads Excel rows, replaces placeholders in Word, generates one PDF per recipient, and creates Outlook drafts (or sends after confirmation) with support for CC/BCC, subject, body, and attachment naming, plus a CSV processing log. The final version fixed the Outlook draft creation issue by switching to a simpler, more reliable Outlook COM path that avoids problematic MAPI readiness checks.

• Template-driven personalization — reads placeholders like <<employee_name>> from a Word template and fills them from matching Excel column headers
• One row, one recipient — processes each Excel row independently and generates a unique, personalized PDF for every person
• Automatic PDF export — fills the template and exports each personalized PDF straight to a dedicated output folder
• Outlook draft creation — builds a draft email per recipient with the correct subject, body, CC/BCC, and the generated PDF attached, ready for review
• Draft or send mode — defaults to a safe "save to Drafts" mode, with an explicit confirmation step required before anything is sent
• One-click macro trigger — runs entirely from a single Word macro, prompting for the Excel file, subject/body, and draft-or-send mode
• CSV processing log — records every row as Draft, Sent, or Skipped with errors, so nothing goes unnoticed

• Platform: Windows Desktop Automation
• Automation: Word VBA, Outlook COM
• Data Source: Microsoft Excel
• Output: PDF Generation, CSV Logging
• AI-Assisted Development: Codex, Claude