Site email issues 
Author: Melissa K.Hello everyone,
I've run into a bit of a problem I'm hoping someone can help with.
On my client's website, they have an online store and a contact us form. Up until recently everything had been working fine - both my client and their customers were receiving the emails they were meant to receive.
However, about two weeks ago, all emails generated from the website were bouncing back with the mailer daemon. The email itself is working fine and has been tested as functioning well.
When the emails were coming back, the implication was that they were being marked as spam by Yahoo and Gmail with these 421 and 554 error codes.
Originally, I had reached out to my client's web host tech support for help, and apparently the SPF record was incorrect, and the DMARC was missing. I have no idea how any of it works so I'm not sure how it changed or why.
But the point is that we think that with the DMARC record, the clients are potentially receiving their end of the emails [at least, a contact us email I sent as a test didn't bounce back for me], however my client's emails are just showing up as the mailer daemon ones, still failing to send/receive with that 554 error code.
Can anyone think of a way to fix this? My first instinct is to think the issue lies on the host's side, but just in case, I figure I'd ask here.
Thank you!
Hello Melissa,
even though the behavior is different than when this is involved, could you check if anything changed if this option is disabled?
You will then need to export the website again:
Author
Hi Eric,
Suprisingly enough, that seems to have done the trick! Just one question, what exactly does this option change? I mean, can I leave it disabled?
Please let me know, and thank you!!
Hello Melissa,
this option allows, with the proper configuration of the hosting's settings, to make it so that, when a user fills in a contact form, this notification reaches the website admin showing the user's address, whereas the default option for this (which is used when disabling this option) makes it so that the notification is from your website's address (although when replying to these e-mails, the user's address should still appear).
Eric
Author
Thanks so much Eric, I appreciate your help!
Author
Hi again - so the issue isn't as resolved as it seemed - now the clients are seemingly not receiving the emails with the items. Could the disabled option have messed something up?
Author
Sorry for the double messages - the problem might be stemming from orders sent through gmail accounts, not sure if that can help in any way.
Hello Melissa,
what address are you using for the sending of e-mails for this website?
Is it an address with the same domain as the website itself, or a more "generic" one?
Eric
Author
Hi Eric,
Yes, it's an email address with the same domain as the website itself. Before this ordeal from last month, everything was working fine - the emails would occassionally land in a spam folder, but otherwise everything worked as intended.
Hello Melissa,
I suggest you contact the hosting provider, as disabling the flag should restore the settings that were used before 2024.2 and, in general, the software deals with configuring the settings, but the sending itself goes through the mail server.
Perhaps some configuration needs to be adjusted, or they can recommend a specific mail script to be used.
Eric
Author
Hi Eric,
Thank you so much, I'll check with them.
Author
Hi again,
So after a lot of back and forth with the hosting provider, the best they could come up with is to say it's an ongoing issue with gmail, and that there's no timeline or guarantee of when that could be resolved.
My client is wondering two things:
First, can anyone think of any other workaround to help resolve this? As mentioned, we were able to isolate the issue to gmail accounts, and we know it has something to do with the SPF/DMARC records, since apparently gmail and yahoo recently increased their security in regards to how it filtered spam from business accounts [or so I was told].
The hosting [Turbify] even sent us to the MX toolbox site to demonstrate that there isn't any actual problem with the coding as it stands.
Secondly, are there any recommendations for good webhosting to switch to? My client's concern is that switching hosting brings no guarantee that the same issue won't be present there. I know Incomedia has partnered with a hosting provider, has this issue been reported with this host?
Thank you,
Melissa
Hello Melissa,
so far we have not received similar reports from users with our hosting.
What e-mail script are you using in the export parameters, PHP Mailer or something else?
You could check the situation using other scripts such as Authenticated SMTP, for example.
Eric
Author
Hi Eric,
Okay, that's good to know. Yes, I'm using php mailer. I tried others, still the same issue. I tried SMTP, but it wasn't working out.
Thank you for your help!
Author
Hi again,
One more question - in terms of switching to a new host, the big issue is the transfer of files, particularly the database. Some of the options my client is considering charge for the transfer, so they want to do it manually.
The database only includes things like client orders [and even then it's just name, email, and what they purchased]. I saw online that the database transfers can depend in complexity depending on how much encrypted information there is. I'm understanding that there wouldn't be any encrypted information [as I don't collect passwords etc], so it should be a simple transfer, right?
Hello Melissa,
I saw you contacted us by e-mail, I will be replying directly there.
Eric