The global Microsoft outage that knocked out Outlook, Teams and other Microsoft 365 tools on Thursday afternoon is still being felt in Montreal on Friday. Hospitals have warned of slower appointment processing, Via Rail has cautioned travellers that trip emails may not arrive, and universities are among the institutions caught up in the disruption. Here is where the Microsoft outage stands in Montreal as of Friday morning, Nov. 13, and what the affected institutions are telling people to do.
This is a developing story, and details may change through the day.
Microsoft outage in Montreal: what’s affected
Hospitals: CHUM and the Jewish General
The biggest local impact has been in health care. As CTV Montreal reported late Thursday, the Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal (CHUM) said appointment requests were taking longer than usual to process and some internal operations were affected. A notice on the hospital’s website warned that “some of our operations and services may be temporarily delayed.”
The Jewish General Hospital said it was also affected. In its own website notice, the hospital said there may be delays in some services, that emails sent during the outage may not be delivered or received, and that appointment confirmations may not be sent while the problem continues.
Nothing in the reports we reviewed suggests emergency departments have stopped receiving patients. But if you’re weighing where to go for non-urgent care while systems are slow, our guide to ER wait times and other options in Quebec is still a useful place to start.
Via Rail
Via Rail said on social media that, because of technical issues with Microsoft services, passengers might not be able to receive email communications about their trip. According to Insurance Business Canada, the rail operator pointed travellers to its online train tracker and SMS alerts instead, and trains themselves kept running. The email problem affects confirmations and trip updates, not the trains.
If you’re heading to or from Gare Centrale this weekend, don’t count on an email to warn you of a schedule change. And if your trip connects to a flight, check our rundown of REM and airport station closures at YUL before you leave.
Universities and other workplaces
CTV’s national coverage listed universities alongside hospitals and Via Rail among the services hit by the outage, which has disrupted Outlook email and Teams for organizations across Canada and the U.S. The reports we reviewed did not name specific Montreal campuses or detail cancelled classes, so students and staff should look to their own school’s official IT and news channels for updates.
What patients, travellers and students should do
Stick to the advice the institutions themselves have given:
- CHUM patients: Call the appointment centre directly at 514-890-8051. The hospital’s phone lines are working, so a phone call is more reliable than waiting on an email right now.
- Jewish General Hospital patients: The hospital has warned that appointment confirmations may not be sent and emails may not go through, so don’t take a missing confirmation as a cancellation. Watch the hospital’s website for updates.
- Via Rail passengers: Use Via Rail’s online train tracker and SMS alerts for trip updates rather than relying on email.
- Students and staff: Watch your institution’s official channels for updates.
One more caution, flagged in the same Insurance Business report: outages tend to bring out scammers. Be suspicious of unsolicited calls claiming to be from Microsoft or “IT support,” and check any unexpected request for passwords or payment changes through a separate, known contact.
What Microsoft says about the cause and the fix
Microsoft has not announced a final root cause, and we won’t guess at one. Here is what the company has said publicly, mostly through its Microsoft 365 service status page and the @MSFT365Status account on X:
- Not a cyberattack, so far: Microsoft has said there is “no indication” the outage was caused by malicious or cyber activity.
- What went wrong, per Microsoft: Some servers became unavailable, which put extra strain on the remaining infrastructure. In later status updates, Microsoft said a core process on affected servers was becoming overwhelmed and causing capacity loss.
- The fix: Microsoft says it has been moving traffic away from affected infrastructure, restarting servers and taking “a measured approach to identify and repair affected infrastructure.” At one point overnight it acknowledged a change was “not taking as expected.”
- Friday morning: According to BNN Bloomberg’s live updates, Microsoft reported “early stabilization and capacity improvements as recovery actions continue” and later “encouraging recovery progress,” with email delivery improving across a growing share of affected infrastructure. It warned that some users may still see intermittent problems.
Microsoft has made email its priority on Friday. Insurance Business reported that the company extended its mail timeout window to 48 hours, meaning delayed messages are held and delivered late rather than bounced back. Messages sent since Thursday may simply land in your inbox later in the day.
Charles Lamanna, a Microsoft executive vice-president, posted on X that the company regretted the disruption to customers and was working to address the issue, Windows Latest reported. Microsoft had not published an estimated time for full restoration as of Friday morning.
The bottom line for Montreal
As of Friday morning, Nov. 13, the Microsoft outage in Montreal is still a nuisance more than a shutdown. Hospitals are open but slower on paperwork, trains are running without the usual emails, and inboxes are refilling gradually. If something matters today, an appointment, a train, a deadline, pick up the phone or check the institution’s website rather than waiting on an email.
We’ll keep following the story. For the rest of today’s local headlines, see our News section, and for the smaller day-to-day stuff, our Everyday News page.
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Photo: JBouchez / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Sources: CTV News Montreal: Microsoft outage affecting operations at Montreal hospitals, CTV News: Microsoft outage impacting hospitals, universities and Via Rail services, CTV News: Microsoft struggles to restore services as outage hits companies and governments worldwide, CTV News / BNN Bloomberg: Microsoft issues continue Friday as company targets email (live), Insurance Business Canada: Hospitals, Via Rail and governments hit as Microsoft outage spreads across Canada, Windows Latest: Was the Microsoft 365 outage a hack?, AzureBlog: Microsoft 365 outage, 12 November 2026, Microsoft 365 status page, @MSFT365Status on X, Via Rail on X
