emails sent to xtra.co.nz

[At home in NZ]

There is a banner on ever page I look at in this Forum, about xtra emails being returned.

I thought this might be affecting me but I have just received a 'new reply to a discussion you are following' email.

xtra used to be on a Yahoo platform but was taken in house a while ago due to problems with Yahoo.

I have drawn the issue to the attention of the ISP for xtra mail and they have replied:

Can we please have the following so we can forward this issue to our complex email support for further investigation,
1. copy of the email that are being sent to xtra email addresses in .eml format
2. copy of the bounce back error message
3. email address used in sending email to xtra email addresses
all of these information will be forwarded to our complex email support for them to investigate and if needed forward it to SMX to get it sorted

I know Peter is extremely busy and may not have had the time to reply to my emailed request.

Thought I'd put it in the Forum so members know I've taken it up on everybody's behalf.

 

[peter]

Yes, three email notifications have bounced back. I don't know what .eml format is, so can't help you there. But I can forward the bounceback messages ,which include the only copies of the emails that there are, and should include all of the information you need.

I'm not aware that you have emailed me.

 

[At home in NZ]

Thanks Peter for your message with all the bounce back details, I sent it to the ISP and am now trying to make them understand that you don't email a Forum!

I had sent two emails to you but never mind, we're onto it now. I didn't get an alert about your comment in this discussion, good job I thought to look.

 

[Bryman]

I also have been beating the ISP about the head for a couple of hours when I finally managed to get connected to somebody rather than a robot. I thought that Spark (formerly NZ Telecom) was a telephone company but hardly anyone can contact them via telephone.

I think the problem is with the spam checker introduced when the email process was separated from Yahoo and may have been tweaked recently but Spark will not admit to that. Normal emails from Peter are received without problem so might it be that forum notifications contain a link/attachment, or similar, which the ISP considers to be possible spam?

At one point it was suggested that the sending email address needs to be in the receiver's webmail address book in order to be whitelisted but I believe that all emails are sent from the 'info' address which does not cause any problem with other transmissions.

I have sent one copy of a bounceback message to the support team but they also want the original message for comparison purposes. They seem to require any messages to be in .eml format (standard email?) but I have been given no info about how to obtain/keep that format for ongoing transmission. I was informed that the bounceback message that I forwarded to them was NOT in .eml format.

 

[At home in NZ]

I was informed that the bounceback message that I forwarded to them was NOT in .eml format.

I have had dealings with Spark about emails in the past. Because of that experience I knew that the bounce back email Peter sent me needed to be sent as an attachment. They have Peter's sample and it is OK for what they need.
I am sitting back and waiting for their snail like customer service.............................

 

[At home in NZ]

It would appear that all my Forum alerts are being blocked. I would like to retain my email address while Spark are investigating in the hope they will able to identify the problem.
Also, if we all use another email address we can't expect Spark to do anything about it as it will no longer be a problem.

I am visiting the Forum to look for updates to discussions.

I am still receiving Lost Cousins Newsletters and if they are coming from the same email address as the alerts it seems to me there's something in the alerts that Spark has programmed to block.

 

[peter]

It would appear that all my Forum alerts are being blocked. I would like to retain my email address while Spark are investigating in the hope they will able to identify the problem.
Also, if we all use another email address we can't expect Spark to do anything about it as it will no longer be a problem.

I am visiting the Forum to look for updates to discussions.

I am still receiving Lost Cousins Newsletters and if they are coming from the same email address as the alerts it seems to me there's something in the alerts that Spark has programmed to block.

LostCousins newsletters are sent from a different server. I can't use the same server for the forum - it won't work at all.

Providing another email address for the forum doesn't mean you have to change your email address - if you use a Gmail address for the forum you can arrange for your emails to be forwarded to your existing address. Even if they don't arrive, at least you'll have a copy at Gmail = at the moment you're not receiving them at all.

 

[At home in NZ]

Providing another email address for the forum doesn't mean you have to change your email address

I think you missed my point, if i change the email address so that I am getting the alerts I will have resolved the issue and taken it out of my ISPs hands.

I pay my ISP to provide a service and when they are blocking messages I expect them to take steps to prevent that from happening.

 

[peter]

I think you missed my point, if i change the email address so that I am getting the alerts I will have resolved the issue and taken it out of my ISPs hands.

I pay my ISP to provide a service and when they are blocking messages I expect them to take steps to prevent that from happening.

If you set up Gmail so that the messages are automatically forwarded to your existing address they'll still be subject to the same checks. Of course, if they do get through then that's useful information which might help your ISP solve the mystery.

 

[Pauline]

I think you missed my point, if i change the email address so that I am getting the alerts I will have resolved the issue and taken it out of my ISPs hands.

Peter's suggestion does make sense, and it's what I did when some of my forum alerts were not reaching me. It doesn't have to be a Gmail address; I already had a forwarding address set up which automatically forwards emails to both my usual email address and to my husband's email address, so I used that.

This enabled me to confirm to my ISP that the problem was definitely with them and not at the forum end, and I was able to provide them with the headers from the emails which reached my husband's email address but not mine. It turned out there was an intermittent DNS issue somewhere.

Once the problem was resolved I switched my email address at the forums back to my usual one again.

 

[Pauline]

I don't know what .eml format is

It's a format used by email programs such as Thunderbird or Outlook to save emails as a file.

 

[peter]

It's a format used by email programs such as Thunderbird or Outlook to save emails as a file.

Thanks - my email program doesn't support it.

 

[Bryman]

Rather than set up a new Gmail account, I changed my forum email address back to my previous UK email account which still has autoforwarding to my NZ address in place. Unfortunately, that forum change sends a confirmation email to the new address, which I did not receive (twice). That left me in a state where I was unable to contribute to the forum. Peter has told me that was due to my 'new' address being managed by Yahoo, which I was not previously aware of. However, that should be irrelevant as the original problem that I and others in NZ experienced involved Spark which has not been managed by Yahoo for a couple of years.

Anyone else trying to use this autoforwarding technique should be aware of this possible complication. When I alerted Peter via separate email, he kindly approved my address change to reinstate my forum privileges but I do not want to keep asking him to do this every time that I attempt something new.

I am still trying to get further response from the Spark technical 'support' group but they seem to have gone into hibernation.

One further thought that has just crossed my mind . . .
Peter told me that he suggested use of Gmail as that would keep a copy of the email online, but initially that is probably true for all email providers. However, my email is set up to use POP3 and I keep all emails on my own system rather than the remote server, which would be the alternative if using IMAP to allow access from several devices. Is anyone else that is affected using IMAP rather than POP3?

 

[At home in NZ]

If you set up Gmail so that the messages are automatically forwarded to your existing address they'll still be subject to the same checks.

I have set up Gmail for the emails I was not receiving from Ancestry and they are forwarded to my xtra address I am now getting all of them. So I don't understand how they are subject to the same checks.

Spark Service
I raised the issue with Spark via their online complaints form and I have been provided with a "How's my Fault Tracking' email with a link to an online tracker in my account, it is showing progress as being still in the investigating part of the process. It was assigned to a specialist team on 2 September, I will chase them up at an appropriate time.

 

[At home in NZ]

Is anyone else that is affected using IMAP rather than POP3?

I am affected and I am using POP3.

 

[peter]

Anyone else trying to use this autoforwarding technique should be aware of this possible complication

It's nothing to do with auto-forwarding, it's the choice of email provider.

Peter told me that he suggested use of Gmail as that would keep a copy of the email online, but initially that is probably true for all email providers.

That's not the reason I suggested Gmail. I suggested Gmail because it's free, and already used successfully by around a fifth of all forum members. Why not try it and see what happens? I suspect Spark will still bounce the forwarded emails, but until you try we'll never know. This problem is taking up an awful lot of my time.

 

[PhilGee]

I don't know if it is the same problem, but I had mail (to a Microsoft mail service address) being bounced in mid August. The response from my e-mail service was that spam filtering had been updated and mail sent from "rotating servers"* was being bounced. The sending service has to inform the receiving service of the problem to become "trusted".

Phil

* A system to spread the load across multiple computers to improve reliability and performance.

 

[peter]

I don't know if it is the same problem, but I had mail (to a Microsoft mail service address) being bounced in mid August. The response from my e-mail service was that spam filtering had been updated and mail sent from "rotating servers"* was being bounced. The sending service has to inform the receiving service of the problem to become "trusted".

Phil

* A system to spread the load across multiple computers to improve reliability and performance.

Microsoft accounts (eg Hotmail) are another source of heartache for those of us who send large mailings. Courteous email providers indicate what action the sender should take to resolve rejections issues.

 

[Bryman]

It's nothing to do with auto-forwarding, it's the choice of email provider.

Please stop and think about the advice being offered rather than complain just because it is not following your thought processes exactly.

I did not suggest that auto-forwarding is causing the problem, rather that is a technique which you suggested to possibly get round the problem. I was warning others that use of such a technique could lead to further problems like I encountered. Similarly, it is probably not the choice of email provider and certainly nothing to do with Yahoo specifically.

I am sorry if this taking up a lot of your time. It is also taking up a lot of my time and probably several other members who are trying to help by identifying just what has changed recently. Please don't take your frustration out on us because some email providers have started to treat some of your system output as spam. It seems quite likely that other email providers may follow suit in the future.

The comment posted by PhilGee does seem to be rather appropriate as identifying a possible cause.

 

[peter]

I am frustrated because despite having been asked to try Gmail neither of you has taken up the suggestion. There are only two members of the forum affected so far, both use the same email provider.

Please will one of you try the Gmail option I suggested, otherwise we'll just be going round in circles. Nothing has changed at my end.