Error populating email body from word documents - excel

Question

I am working on an excel macro to send a series of emails each with a unique attachment, and one of three template emails that are saved as word documents. Everything is working well, except pulling the body of the email in from the word document. The problem seems to be with WordEditor. I get the following error
Err.Description:The operation failed.
Err.Number:-2147467259
Err.Source:Microsoft Outlook
Here is the code I have tried:
Sub SendDCLEmails()
Dim OutlookApp As Object
Dim OutlookMail As Object
Dim WordApp As Object
Dim WordDoc As Object
Dim DCLFile As String 'Attachment that differs for each email
Dim DCLCount As Integer 'Number of emails that will be sent
Dim toList As String
Dim ccList As String
Dim CoverLetter As String 'Word document template email
Dim fileCheckDCL As String
Dim fileCheckCover As String
Dim editor As Object
'Set references to Outlook
On Error Resume Next
Set OutlookApp = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")
If Err <> 0 Then Set OutlookApp = New Outlook.Application
On Error GoTo 0
'Set references to Word
On Error Resume Next
Set WordApp = GetObject(, "Word.Application")
If Err <> 0 Then Set WordApp = New Word.Application
On Error GoTo 0
Sheets("Contacts").Select
'Create email for each record on "Contacts" tab
DCLCount = ActiveSheet.UsedRange.Rows.Count - 1
For i = 1 To DCLCount
DCLFile = Range("AD1").Offset(i, 0).Value & "\" & Range("AE1").Offset(i, 0).Value
CoverLetter = Range("AF1").Offset(i, 0).Value
fileCheckDCL = Dir(DCLFile)
fileCheckCover = Dir(CoverLetter)
'Run some validations and generate the toList and ccList variables.
Set WordDoc = WordApp.Documents.Open(CoverLetter)
WordDoc.Content.Copy
'Create Emails
Set OutlookMail = OutlookApp.CreateItem(0)
With OutlookMail
.Display
.To = toList
.CC = ccList
.Subject = Range("AG1").Offset(i, 0).Value
Set editor = .GetInspector.WordEditor 'This is where the error occurs.
editor.Content.Paste
.Attachments.Add DCLFile
.Send
End With
WordDoc.Close savechanges:=False
End If
toList = vbNullString
ccList = vbNullString
CoverLetter = vbNullString
DCLFile = vbNullString
fileCheckDCL = vbNullString
fileCheckCover = vbNullString
Set editor = Nothing
Next i
OutlookApp.Quit
WordApp.Quit
End Sub

Answer 1

There is no need to use late and early-binding technologies in the VBA macros:
Set OutlookApp = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")
If Err <> 0 Then Set OutlookApp = New Outlook.Application
Instead, you need to use one or another. Read more about that in the Using early binding and late binding in Automation article. I'd suggest declaring all objects with real classes (early-binding), it may allow avoiding mistakes with syntax further. And use the New operator in the code instead of CreateObject one.
Set editor = .GetInspector.WordEditor 'This is where the error occurs.
Calling the WordEditor property may sometimes fail if the Inspector is not yet visible and initialized. Try to call the Display method prior getting the Word editor value.
Also instead of relying on Word documents as templates you may create templates in Outlook and use the Application.CreateItemFromTemplate method which creates a new Microsoft Outlook item from an Outlook template (.oft) and returns the new item. Read more about that in the article which I wrote for the technical blog, see How To: Create a new Outlook message based on a template.