Intermittent problems with email forwarders

[Simon Edwards]

Hi,

My domain is currently hosted on GoDaddy.com and I don't actually use it to host a website but I do use it to forward emails to a group of 40 or so colleagues.

So, I have Gone to Cpanel > EMail > Forwarders and have entered multiple entries where 'address to forward' is [email protected] and 'destination' is to a colleagues email address ie [email protected]

So, the next forwarder would be 'address to forward' is again [email protected] and 'destination' is [email protected]

And so on until I have 40 entries. Then when anyone sends an email to [email protected] it gets forwarded to all 40 entries ([email protected],com, [email protected] etc etc. etc.)

Anyway, this has been working ok up to about 6 months ago, but now I am getting very intermittent reports of one or two (random) people not receiving emails that have been sent to [email protected]

No error messages, no bounce backs at all. Most of the people get the emails but just occasionally one or two don't. And they are often not the same people.

So, I called GoDaddy and they tell me that forwarders are not designed to be used like this, it is very old technology, and they can't support me. Although they did applaud my ingenuity in using the system in this way! (They did try to sell me an upgrade though to something that would do the same thing but cost me more money.)

Does anyone have any suggestions as to what might be happening, and possibly a work around?

 

[Infopro]

I do use it to forward emails to a group of 40 or so colleagues.

Have you considered setting up proper email lists instead of doing it this way?

 

[Simon Edwards]

Have you considered setting up proper email lists instead of doing it this way?

I'm not sure how I would do that. Can you signpost me to some documentation, or give me a rough outline of how I'd do that?

 

[mtindor]

If somebody told me that they set up 40 forwards to forward [email protected] mail to 40 other addresses, I'd say that this was "ugly". But I certainly was unaware that it wasn't supported. I don't recall seeing anything in the cPanel interface that states a specific limit to the number of addresses that an email can be forwarded to. It should work.

It baffles me that GoDaddy simply tells you they can't support you though. They might not have a solution to your issue, and if that is what they meant then that is what they should say.

Per Infopro's recommendation [and I'm not sure this was specifically what he was thinking], you certainly could set up a Mailman mailing list for this purpose. Mailman is [or should be] included on all cPanel accounts unless GoDaddy blocks the ability to use Mailman. Use the tools that are already available to you.

Mike

 

[ruzbehraja]

So, I called GoDaddy and they tell me that forwarders are not designed to be used like this, it is very old technology, and they can't support me.

This is correct. Most Mail Providers have started to block out forwarders sending out in bulk, because very often, spam mail also goes out from those forwarders to the recipient.

See: - Removed Link to Paid Service Suggestion -

 

[Simon Edwards]

If somebody told me that they set up 40 forwards to forward [email protected] mail to 40 other addresses, I'd say that this was "ugly". But I certainly was unaware that it wasn't supported. I don't recall seeing anything in the cPanel interface that states a specific limit to the number of addresses that an email can be forwarded to. It should work.

It baffles me that GoDaddy simply tells you they can't support you though. They might not have a solution to your issue, and if that is what they meant then that is what they should say.

Per Infopro's recommendation [and I'm not sure this was specifically what he was thinking], you certainly could set up a Mailman mailing list for this purpose. Mailman is [or should be] included on all cPanel accounts unless GoDaddy blocks the ability to use Mailman. Use the tools that are already available to you.

Mike

Thanks Mike,

Very interesting and it confirms my own thoughts. Yes, my current solution isn't nearly as elegant as it could be, (a nicer way of putting it than 'ugly'!), but it works. Or at least it did do.

The GoDaddy Cpanel interface does not have Mailman included. Which is why they were surprised I'd found a way to set up a list without paying them more money for an upgrade which would allow me to do this using something like Mailman. So I suspect you are right, they weren't interested in resolving my problem, rather than they couldn't, because they wanted to upgrade me to give me the functionality I had already created, albeit they didn't intend allowing me to do that.

But having done some more googling, I now find there is a well know universal problem with btinternet mail accounts at the moment, and possibly also gmail accounts, in that emails don't get through to the recipients but neither end gets an error message. BT appear less than interested in fixing this for their users, so I'm told. So, I'm now wondering if my problem is actually with my 'lists' or in fact the end users own email accounts. I'll need to do some more investigation here.

In any case, if I can't resolve it, I've now come across Googles own "Google Groups" where you can set lists up like the one I need for free, so if all else fails I'll switch to using that instead.

But thanks for all your help on here. It has certainly pointed me in the right direction.

Simon

 

[mtindor]

Thanks Mike,

Very interesting and it confirms my own thoughts. Yes, my current solution isn't nearly as elegant as it could be, (a nicer way of putting it than 'ugly'!), but it works. Or at least it did do.

Sorry. I'm not known for eloquent speech

The GoDaddy Cpanel interface does not have Mailman included. Which is why they were surprised I'd found a way to set up a list without paying them more money for an upgrade which would allow me to do this using something like Mailman. So I suspect you are right, they weren't interested in resolving my problem, rather than they couldn't, because they wanted to upgrade me to give me the functionality I had already created, albeit they didn't intend allowing me to do that.

Sounds like you hit the nail on the head. Pretty crazy. Out of all of the places I've hosted [on cPanel], I can't think of a place that didn't have mailman as an option. That's ashame.

But having done some more googling, I now find there is a well know universal problem with btinternet mail accounts at the moment, and possibly also gmail accounts, in that emails don't get through to the recipients but neither end gets an error message. BT appear less than interested in fixing this for their users, so I'm told. So, I'm now wondering if my problem is actually with my 'lists' or in fact the end users own email accounts. I'll need to do some more investigation here.

I have no experience with BTInternet, but I've never had a problem with Google that wasn't attributable to the Google customer having filters set up to move mail to other folders based upon certain criteria. The Google user would claim that they didn't get the email, and my server would show that the email was accepted by Google. I've never known Google to just "drop" email into the great abyss on purpose, unlike some other high profile free email services I can think of. If it didn't go into the Inbox or Spam folder in Google, it had been redirected to another folder via a filter rule -- usually one that filtered based upon text in the subject or body.

In any case, if I can't resolve it, I've now come across Googles own "Google Groups" where you can set lists up like the one I need for free, so if all else fails I'll switch to using that instead.

But thanks for all your help on here. It has certainly pointed me in the right direction.

I'm glad you found a solution that will work if needed. You're welcome !

Mike[/quote][/QUOTE]