Both my wife's iPad and iPhone and my iPad and iPhone still get stuck at "checking for mail" then will error out and say it can't connect to the server.

I have been using outlook.com email on my iPhone and iPad since the day it became outlook.com.  My settings are correct.  I have even tried your recommendation to delete the account and re-add it.  Still not,working.

Please fix this!  This is inexcusable.  The entire reason I went to outlook.com was because Microsoft touted how reliable it was over Google.

I NEED MY EMAIL,BACK!