Microsoft on Monday said it had restored e-mail service to Hotmail users after many reported that their entire accounts were deleted without warning.

“We have restored the emails to those who were effected,” Microsoft said in a Monday note on its help site.

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Users who are still experiencing problems are encouraged to log into windowslivehelp.com and post details about the problem.

“We sincerely apologize and thank you for your continued patience,” Microsoft said.

Over the weekend, Microsoft’s official support forum started showing posts from people who reported that their entire Hotmail accounts were gone. Users were able to log in, but there were no e-mails in their inbox, no sent or deleted messages, and no folders.

One user reported getting an error message upon sign-in on December 31 before seeing a “new” Hotmail account welcome message.

On Sunday, Microsoft said it had “identified the source of the issue have restored e-mail access to those who were effected” but did not elaborate. For users who did not receive mail during the down time, Microsoft said it was “in the process of rectifying that and should be finished by late [Sunday] Pacific time.”