OL2k3 - priority = 'none'

[Wowbagger]

Outlook 2003 running stand-alone (no Exchange server) pulling messages down
from a pop3 server. Windows XP Professional.

I set up a custom view in my unread messages search folder and noted
something odd: when sorting the messages by priority they were divided up
into _four_ groups, namely 'high' 'normal' 'low' and 'none'. When I right
click and pick 'options' on one of the 'none' importance emails I see that
the importance selector is already set to 'normal' - if I click the
drop-down arrow, pick 'normal' again then close and save changes the message
is then correctly set.

Question one: how are so many emails getting flagged with 'none' importance?

Question two: is there an easy way to prevent this from happening again in
the future? So far all of the messages with 'none' importance should really
have been 'normal' but they are appearing beneath the 'low' importance
messages in my sort.

Thank you

 

[Wowbagger]

Followup: I created a rule that sets all incoming messages as 'normal'
priority but the flag is still not being set properly and the messages are
being grouped into the 'none' priority category.

Is there no fix to this issue?