Problems receiving replies to my e-mails

  • Thread starter Thread starter Zrat
  • Start date Start date
Z

Zrat

I've been having serious problems with Outlook that I can't
solve. For the last three or so weeks, three individual senders have
had replying to my original e-mails. That is, if they reply to
one of my original e-mails, it never shows up -- anywhere or anytime
-- in Outlook. But if I use Yahoo to check my account (Verizon DSL),
it appears, as long as I haven't tried to check for new mail in
Outlook. If I do check for the messages in Outlook, it's gone forever.

Also, if I check my mail on Verizon netmail (Web), the replied-to
messages do appear, and then they appear in Outlook after I check my
mail there.

The strange thing is, if the senders *forward* their replies to me, I
do receive it. And it only happens with these individual users--I do
receive replies from all other senders. I've checked everything I can
think of, including all of my Outlook settings (all correct),
uninstalling and reinstalling Outlook, disabling my Kerio
firewall, disabling e-mail virus checking, disabling virus protection
altogether, clearing the Outlook forms cache, etc.

But it's still happening! Any thoughts would be appreciated.
 
When you send an e-mail, the Reply-To header dictates to where a reply
to your e-mail gets sent. If it is blank, the From header is used. If
non-blank, the reply goes there. Perhaps you have specified a Reply-To
e-mail address that doesn't exist or goes to another e-mail account that
you are forgetting to monitor. It is also possible that your e-mail
address in the From header is incorrect. When the recipient forwards
their reply to you, they are specifying your e-mail address rather than
using the e-mail address in the From or Reply-To headers. On a reply,
they are relying upon the e-mail address in the Reply-To header, if
specified, or From headers are valid for delivery to you.

You don't mention your setup so I'll have to assume that you paid for
POP3 service at Yahoo and are yanking your Yahoo e-mails into a POP3
account defined in Outlook. If the e-mail is in your Yahoo e-mail
account (as seen by using their webmail interface), it will disappear
when any e-mail client downloads that message because it gets marked as
read (which means it gets deleted). If you don't see then see the
e-mail in Outlook, it is a problem on your end. Perhaps you have a view
enabled that won't show the message. Perhaps you have rules defined
that moves the e-mail to a different folder or [permanently] deletes it.
Maybe you are using a plug-in or proxy to eliminate spam or perform some
other function that is filtering out the message; the e-mail gets
retrieved from your Yahoo account but gets deleted before being
delivered to Outlook.

If nothing helps, enable transport logging (Options -> Other ->
Advanced), exit Outlook, delete any OPMlog.log file that currently
exists, open Outlook, and do a manual mail poll and let the first
scheduled one to occur, then disable logging in Outlook and exit it to
look into the log file as to where Outlook connected and what happened
during the POP3 and SMTP commands. You'll need to send a test e-mail to
your Yahoo account to ensure there is one there to get yanked during
this test to produce some output into the log file.
 
Thank you for the wealth of information, Vanguard -- I appreciate it.
I'm going to investigate each of these things now.
 
Okay, I gave transport logging a shot. After I enabled logging, here's
what I did:

1. Asked two senders to reply to my e-mail.
2. Asked same two senders to forward a confirmation of that reply.

I did receive the reply and the forward from one sender, but received
only the forward from the other sender. In the log, as seen below, the
three e-mails (two forwards, one reply) do appear. The server claims
three new messages, but there should be four. However, there is a
extra line, it seems, that only appears as "." I don't understand this
-- is the server not interpreting the fourth e-mail (which is a reply
from sender two), or is this normal server behavior to include that
"."?

Also, I asked the senders to reply to another e-mail, then I retrieved
the messages from my Verizon netmail account (on the Web), and then
retrieved them in Outlook. They appeared in the log as normal.

Here's the log where one e-mail is missing (what's the "."?):

2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> +OK 3 messages
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 1
<614229C01B2AEE4491847CD98869F5A918E3B0@(sender1)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 2
<614229C01B2AEE4491847CD98869F5A918E3B1@(sender 1)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 3
<836F3B64E5BFBF47AB39BAA0FB24B852457C9C@(sender 2)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> . <---????
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): [tx] LIST
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> +OK 3 messages
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 1 4481
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 2 4618
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 3 3367
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> . <---????
 
The '.' is the way that the POP3 protocol indicates the end of the list -
there are only 3 messages on the server in this log. The message never made
it to the server.

--
Jeff Stephenson
Outlook Development
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights


Zrat said:
Okay, I gave transport logging a shot. After I enabled logging, here's
what I did:

1. Asked two senders to reply to my e-mail.
2. Asked same two senders to forward a confirmation of that reply.

I did receive the reply and the forward from one sender, but received
only the forward from the other sender. In the log, as seen below, the
three e-mails (two forwards, one reply) do appear. The server claims
three new messages, but there should be four. However, there is a
extra line, it seems, that only appears as "." I don't understand this
-- is the server not interpreting the fourth e-mail (which is a reply
from sender two), or is this normal server behavior to include that
"."?

Also, I asked the senders to reply to another e-mail, then I retrieved
the messages from my Verizon netmail account (on the Web), and then
retrieved them in Outlook. They appeared in the log as normal.

Here's the log where one e-mail is missing (what's the "."?):

2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> +OK 3 messages
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 1
<614229C01B2AEE4491847CD98869F5A918E3B0@(sender1)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 2
<614229C01B2AEE4491847CD98869F5A918E3B1@(sender 1)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 3
<836F3B64E5BFBF47AB39BAA0FB24B852457C9C@(sender 2)>
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> . <---????
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): [tx] LIST
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> +OK 3 messages
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 1 4481
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 2 4618
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> 3 3367
2003.09.10 10:19:48 POP3 (incoming.verizon.net): <rx> . <---????


If nothing helps, enable transport logging (Options -> Other ->
Advanced), exit Outlook, delete any OPMlog.log file that currently
exists, open Outlook, and do a manual mail poll and let the first
scheduled one to occur, then disable logging in Outlook and exit it to
look into the log file as to where Outlook connected and what happened
during the POP3 and SMTP commands. You'll need to send a test e-mail to
your Yahoo account to ensure there is one there to get yanked during
this test to produce some output into the log file.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Why would this be happening with three separate people? It seems that
the problem must be stemming from a configuration problem in my
e-mails somehow.
 
Does your e-mail provider also provide a web interface to your e-mail
account? If so:

- Send yourself 2 test e-mails. Use a different subject header for
each, like "Test of reply" and "Test of forwarding".
- Close your e-mail client (so it doesn't auto-receive your test e-mail
on a scheduled mail poll).
- Open your browser and go to your e-mail account using the web page for
it.
- Wait until both e-mails show up. Since you were using your ISP's SMTP
server to send to your ISP's POP3 server, the e-mails should be there
immediately. You don't need to read the e-mails; just wait until both
show up.
- Close the browser and open your e-mail client.
- Do a mail poll (if one isn't done automatically on startup due to
scheduled polling) to yank your pending e-mails .
- Do both e-mails show up?
- Reply to one of the test e-mails (you are replying to your own message
so the reply will show up in your e-mail account). In the body, add
some identifying text, like "This is a reply message".
- Forward the other test e-mail to yourself. In the body, add something
to identify it, like "This is a forwarded message".
- Close your e-mail client and use the webmail interface to see when
both messages appear in your e-mail account.
- After both the reply and forwarded test e-mails show up, close the
browser and open your e-mail client.
- Do a mail poll (if one isn't done automatically on startup due to
scheduled polling).
- Does the reply message show up? Does the forwarded message show up?

If you can receive both the reply and forwarded copy of the test e-mails
then most of your setup is okay but you might still incur problems with
receiving e-mails from other users depending filtering or rules you have
defined. Check what options or features you have configured for your
e-mail account (i.e., on the server end). Open the webmail interface to
your e-mail account and check the following:

- Do you have an e-mail screening (i.e., anti-spam) option enabled on
your e-mail account? If so, do you have it configured to delete suspect
e-mails or move them into a holding folder, like Bulk or Junk? This
option is defined on your e-mail account, NOT back in your e-mail
client, so any action taken by this option is executed on the server end
(so any folder into which suspect e-mail gets moved into will be in your
e-mail account on the server, not back in your e-mail client).
- Do you have any filter rules defined?
- Do you have forwarding enabled (to move any e-mails received at this
account to another e-mail account)? Occasionally the forwarding option
doesn't work reliably.

Next would be to check your own system:

- Do you have any proxies inline with the data stream for your inbound
or outbound e-mails? This would include anti-spam products that run as
proxies, like SpamPal?
- Are you yanking your e-mails from a POP3 mail server or from a webmail
provider (Hotmail, Yahoo, etc.)? If so, are you using an HTTP account
defined in your e-mail client, or are you using an HTTP-to-POP3 protocol
converter proxy, like Hotmail Popper or YahooPOPs?
- Do you have any e-mail monitoring utilities running, like MailWasher,
POP Peeper, or ePrompter?
- Do you have any plug-ins installed into Outlook, like SpamNet,
SpamSource, PKZip, WinZip? Look under Tools -> Options -> Other ->
Advanced under Add-ins and COM plug-ins (ignore the one, if present, for
Exchange Extensions).
- Are you using a view on your folder(s) in your e-mail client other
than one that shows ALL messages?
- Do you have any [enabled] rules defined in your e-mail client?

If nothing above hits the mark to solve your problem, have your friends
again reply and forward test e-mails sent by you (and without any
attachments). If they forwarded your message (back to you), have it
forwarded by including it within the body of the e-mail, NOT as an
attachment. However, this time do NOT use your e-mail client to yank
their reply and forwarded messages. Instead use the webmail interface
to look at what is actually in your e-mail account on the server (i.e.,
don't yank them off the server but instead look at them there).

- Do you see both the reply and forwarded messages listed in the Inbox?
- Can you successfully open both messages?
- After opening the messages, do they remain in the Inbox?
- Try replying (but do not send) to both the reply and forwarded
message. You just want to see if the messages can be fully read to
allow you to compose a reply to them.
- Does the webmail interface show any attachments to these messages
(neither should have an attachment).

If you never saw both the reply and forwarded messages from your friends
in the webmail interface to your e-mail account then it is a delivery
problem on their end. Obviously you can only read what your mail server
receives.
 
If the server is not telling Outlook that a message is present, there's
nothing that you (or Outlook) can do about it. It may be that the message
never made it to the server. It may be that some anti-spam software on the
server is deleting replies from one of the people - you might ask your ISP
if there's a way to see the messages they've classified as spam and see if
the replies ended up there.
 
Thanks again, Vanguard, for all of your help. I went through each of
these items. I do know that I don't have any filters/spam
guards/firewall settings/etc. that would be preventing replies from
getting to me. Also, all of my self-tests are successful. The problem,
as shown by the log file, appears to be that the replies aren't even
making it to the Verizon server. Yet, because it's happening just with
these three users, and they're not having problems with anyone else,
shows that somehow, perhaps a configuration error is happening
somewhere on my end but is affecting their sending of the e-mail.
 
If anything, the problem is likely to be configuration on either their end
or something related to their ISP (do these three people have the same
ISP?). Ask them to check the email address they see for you when they reply
to a message from you, just to make sure that you're not accidentally
setting a "Reply-To" field in your messages that points to the wrong
address.
 
If the senders cannot get their e-mails to your mailbox then there is
nothing *you* can do about it. You can only read e-mails that get
delivered. You obviously cannot read e-mails that maybe got sent but
were never delivered. If you are receiving e-mails from other senders
then it is not your ISP, account configuration, or e-mail client that is
the problem. You could try having a sender (for whom you currently do
receive their e-mails) send an exact copy of the content of the message
that another sender (for whom you don't get their e-mails) would have
sent. This would check if the content of the message is the problem and
maybe anti-spam filtering, if enabled on your ISP e-mail account, is
deleting this e-mail. Other things to check:

- Are those flaky senders using Rich-Text Format? If so, have them use
HTML or plain-text format for their e-mails.

- Are those flaky senders attaching files onto their e-mails?

- Are they using digital signatures via x.509 security certificates or
with PGP, gPG, or other security mechanism for digitally signing and/or
encrypting their messages?

- Is your receiving e-mail account on Yahoo, or some other mail provider
domain? From what domain are the flaky e-mails sent?

- Have then send their test e-mail to yourself AND to someone else. If
the e-mail arrives to that someone else then at least you know their
e-mail actually DID get sent out from their ISP's SMTP server. If you
don't have someone else to use in this test, simply open a Hotmail or
Yahoo account and have the sender send you their test e-mails to your
e-mail address and to your Hotmail or Yahoo e-mail address. Have them
specify the multiple recipients in the To header.
 
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