Macro fails to create appointments based on worksheet data

I have an Excel macro that I run, which takes activity names, dates and times from the spreadsheet and places them into the Outlook calendar. This works fine when Outlook is running, but when it is not, the macro does not make the appointments.

I have made an error checking piece that checks to see if a running instance of Outlook is running and if not creates one but it still only works when Outlook is running.

Any ideas why??

Sub SetAppt()
  ' Dim olApp As Outlook.Application
    Dim olApt As AppointmentItem
    Dim olApp As Object

    'if an instance of outlook is not open then create an instance of the application
    On Error Resume Next
    Set olApp = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")

    If er.Number = 429 Then
      Set olApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application.14")
    End If

    On Error GoTo 0

    Set olApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
    ' Set olApp = New Outlook.Application

    'declare an index for all the variables
     Dim i As Integer
     i = 2

    'declare the variables that will hold the data and set their initial value
     Dim occ, actName, srtTime, duration As String
     occ = "A" & i
     actName = "B" & i
     srtTime = "F" & i
     duration = "G" & i

     'for holding different parts of the dates/times that will be split
     Dim splitStr() As String
     Dim splitDrtion() As String

     'loop until there is no more items
     While Range(occ).Value <> ""

      'create a new appointment
      Set olApt = olApp.CreateItem(olAppointmentItem)

      'we must split the start time and date
      splitStr = Split(Range(srtTime).Value, " ")

      Dim oDate As Date
      oDate = splitStr(0)

      'we must also spilt the duration (number/hour)
      splitDrtion = Split(Range(duration).Value, " ")

        'with is used to acces the appointment items properties
        With olApt

          .Start = oDate + TimeValue(splitStr(1))

          'if the duration is in hours then multiply number else leave it
          If splitDrtion(1) = "Hour" Then
            .duration = 60 * splitDrtion(0)
          Else
            .duration = splitDrtion(0)
          End If

          .Subject = Range(occ).Value
          .Body = Range(actName).Value
          .Save
         End With

        'increment i and reset all the variables with the new number
        i = i + 1
        occ = "A" & i
        actName = "B" & i
        srtTime = "F" & i
        duration = "G" & i

        Set olApt = Nothing
      Wend
      Set olApp = Nothing
End Sub

Building on Siddharth's example, here is a refactored version of your code.

Sub SetAppt()
  Dim olApt As Object ' Outlook.AppointmentItem
  Dim olApp As Object ' Outlook.Application
  Dim i As Long
  Dim apptRange As Variant

  Const olAppointmentItem As Long = 1

  ' create outlook
  Set olApp = GetOutlookApp

  If olApp Is Nothing Then
    MsgBox "Could not start Outlook"
    Exit Sub
  End If

  ' read appts into array
  apptRange = Range(Cells(2, 1), Cells(Rows.Count, 7).End(xlUp)).value

  For i = LBound(apptRange) To UBound(apptRange)
    Set olApt = olApp.CreateItem(olAppointmentItem)
    With olApt
      .Start = apptRange(i, 6)
      If InStr(apptRange(i, 7), "Hour") > 0 Then
        ' numeric portion cell is delimited by space
        .Duration = 60 * Split(apptRange(i, 7), " ")(0)
      Else
        .Duration = apptRange(i, 7)
      End If

      .Subject = apptRange(i, 1)
      .Body = apptRange(i, 2)
      .Save
    End With
  Next i

End Sub
Function GetOutlookApp() As Object
  On Error Resume Next
  Set GetOutlookApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
End Function

This code reads your worksheet data into an array. This avoids the time penalty that comes from the COM interaction between VBA and Excel.

We loop through the array and create a new appointment for each row.

Using the following sample data, it worked regardless of whether Outlook was open or not (Outlook being closed makes it obviously slower, however).

There is in fact no need to check if Outlook is open.