Why is email delivery being delayed so long?

[maestroc]

I am having an issue where incoming email is being delayed sometimes by as much as 12 hours when an identical email, sent at the same time, to my spouse arrives almost instantly. I will paste the headers of one of the emails below (scrubbed or privacy).

If I am reading it right the email is sent at 8:33 Pacific time but does not arrive at the webhosts mailbox until 22:28 Pacific.

It is then finally delivered to my gmail box at 23:38 Pacific.

I don't see anything alarming in the headers to tell me why it would be getting delayed by over 12 hours. Any ideas what to do or look for?

Headers of the email are below:

Delivered-To: [email protected]
Received: by 2002:a81:2285:0:0:0:0:0 with SMTP id i127csp394398ywi;
Mon, 22 Feb 2021 23:38:37 -0800 (PST)
X-Google-Smtp-Source: ABdhPJwz5uayKjiydX7gq3CAgq00ZXOKDnWBjAnOAKezf1PEKXy9amnLv4WOAUCj2h+YnrGOalDtcTJNq/c=
X-Received: by 2002:a4a:9c85:: with SMTP id z5mr18985555ooj.93.1614065916464;
Mon, 22 Feb 2021 23:38:36 -0800 (PST)
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com;
spf=pass (google.com: domain of [email protected] designates 209.85.160.172 as permitted sender) smtp.mailfrom=[email protected];
dkim=pass [email protected] header.s=20161025 header.b=M+hKFGhE
Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of [email protected] designates 209.85.160.172 as permitted sender) client-ip=209.85.160.172;
Received: by 2002:a05:6808:1382:: with POP3 id c2mf3258766oiw.6;
Mon, 22 Feb 2021 23:38:36 -0800 (PST)
X-Gmail-Fetch-Info: j----------------.org 3 mail.--------------.org 110 j------------------.org
Return-Path: <[email protected]>
Delivered-To: j-------------------.org
Received: from ---------------hosting.net by ---------------hosting.net with LMTP id EKgFBqigNGCHSgAAXFtjMQ (envelope-from <[email protected]>) for <j------------------.org>; Tue, 23 Feb 2021 06:28:56 +0000
Return-path: <[email protected]>
Envelope-to: j----------------.org
Delivery-date: Tue, 23 Feb 2021 06:28:56 +0000
Received: from mail-qt1-f172.google.com ([209.85.160.172]:43150) by ------------------hosting.net with esmtps
(TLS1.2) tls TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_GCM_SHA256 (Exim 4.93) (envelope-from <[email protected]>) id 1lERBc-0004xV-1W for j-----------.org; Tue, 23 Feb 2021 06:28:56 +0000
Received: by mail-qt1-f172.google.com with SMTP id b3so3657354qtj.10
for <j-------------.org>; Mon, 22 Feb 2021 22:28:18 -0800 (PST)

**removed DKIM, etc**


X-Gm-Message-State: AOAM532CJyggdiYT9lMaGkZ5oTiITwC8pF9b3+J25xSNa4GW3gnUnLBY 3sKdcGeqcV+31IDcO+Yo4AUMPXZAtbq/+A==
X-Received: by 2002:a37:a811:: with SMTP id r17mr21952529qke.332.1614011592967;
Mon, 22 Feb 2021 08:33:12 -0800 (PST)
Received: from ?IPv6:2603:7000:3200:1564:1c16:3fc3:1dab:2690? (2603-7000-3200-1564-1c16-3fc3-1dab-2690.res6.spectrum.com. [2603:7000:3200:1564:1c16:3fc3:1dab:2690])
by smtp.gmail.com with ESMTPSA id t71sm12507732qka.86.2021.02.22.08.33.12
(version=TLS1_3 cipher=TLS_AES_128_GCM_SHA256 bits=128/128);
Mon, 22 Feb 2021 08:33:12 -0800 (PST)
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary=Apple-Mail-893EEF3E-66A5-4978-A5B8-2628A703F238
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
From: Peter [email protected]>
Mime-Version: 1.0 (1.0)
Subject: Re: Artist Fellowship
Date: Mon, 22 Feb 2021 11:33:11 -0500

 

[ffeingol]

Try pasting the headers here: Messageheader It will help you see how long the mail was in each server long it's path.

 

[cPRex]

I would also check the mail logs directly on your server in /var/log/exim_mainlog to see if the mail transaction is being handled quickly there. If you see the message being accepted by Gmail quickly on your server side, you can at least be confident that the issue is not with your system, but something external to your machine.

 

[maestroc]

Try pasting the headers here: Messageheader It will help you see how long the mail was in each server long it's path.

OMG! I have been wanting something like that for so long! Awesome! TY!

It is saying it was stuck at Google for 14 hours... Here is a photo of the results:

 

[maestroc]

Anyone know why things would be getting held up like this? Just got another one that appears it was sitting at google for 32 hours. Apparently this is happening with multiple senders. Not all emails are delayed but a lot of them are... And in looking at this, are they really getting held up at google or is it in the chain between cpanel and sending it on?

 

[maestroc]

I am being told by a google person that it is taking 20 seconds for him to connect to my MX server and that google times out after 10-15. Any idea what might be causing this or what I should do to fix it?

 

[ottdev]

Check your mail server statistics for clues as to whether it's not keeping up with volume.
Also, test from several non-gmail sender accounts - do they arrive quickly .... is the issue with all inbound or only inbound from Gmail ?
Check to see if any gmail IPs are blocked in your firewall ?

 

[cPRex]

@maestroc - the 20-second delay is normal as outlined here:

Email from major providers arrives with a delay

Symptoms When receiving an email from a major provider, such as Gmail, Outlook, or Yahoo, there is sometimes a delay in the message arriving in your inbox. Description cPanel implements an autom...

support.cpanel.net

but that would only effect inbound messages, and wouldn't be related to why outbound messages are sitting in the queue so long at the providers. If the message is reaching Gmail in a normal amount of time, and then is sitting in their queue for an extended period of time, that would be up to them to diagnose and resolve.

 

[microvax]

Hello,
It seems like I have this problem too.
Today I received a report of an email that was sent today in the morning (using Gmail) appeared
in the destination inbox (in my CPanel server) almost 9 hours after.

PS: Greylisting is disabled in my server

 

[cPanelAnthony]

Hello @microvax

Can you confirm whether or not these delayed emails actually exist in your Exim queue? There is a chance that they are stuck in the queue, but haven't yet been delivered. Next time you notice an email hasn't arrived, try checking "Mail Queue Manager" in WHM to see if it's actually on the server.

Mail Queue Manager | cPanel & WHM Documentation

The Mail Queue Manager allows you to view, delete, and attempt to deliver queued messages that the system has not yet delivered to their destinations.

docs.cpanel.net

Also, you can use utilities such as exigrep to search the Exim logs for a reference to the email transaction.

Tutorial - Common Exim Commands

Quick Reference: Commands exigrep - finding message information in the logs exiqgrep - finding message information in the queue exiwhat - what is exim doing? Flags Counting messages in the queue Headers/Body of messages in the queue Testing mail...

forums.cpanel.net