I'm not so familiar with the Express version but surely in the account settings one has to set up so the client polls the server on the Net at regular intervals checking for new e-mails ? Try checking the settings for your wife's account within Outlook and see if there is something unticked. An additional thing to do is to look on the service provider's website to see what instructions they have for setting up Outlook Express with them. There'll be settings for downloading as well as uploading.