Helping people with computers... one answer at a time.
One of the casualties of the war against spam is reliable email deliverability. Sometimes mail simply never shows up. We'll look at what can be done.
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This turns out to be a fairly common problem, and not just for Hotmail. Yahoo and other email services seem to suffer the same problem from time to time.
And no, I know of nothing you can do.
Strike that, I do know of one thing you can do, but you won't like it.
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As you've described, the scenario is very, very simple:
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Someone sends you an email
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You don't get it
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The sender doesn't get any indication that the mail wasn't delivered
It's the worst of all possible scenarios - you can't know what you didn't receive, and the sender has no indication that nothing was delivered. Neither of you realize that there's any problem until much, much later.
It's the most frustrating of all possible scenarios.
And to cover the stock recommendations:
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Check your junk mail folder
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Clear any filters you have set that might automatically act on incoming email
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Add the sender's email address to your address book. On some email providers this acts as a kind of "whitelist", or at least increases the probability that email from that person will get delivered
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Make sure that the sender isn't sending something that "looks like" spam. For example if his email is talking about enlarging body parts, then it's highly likely to get filtered as spam. Sadly it doesn't have to be that blatant - legitimate messages about breast cancer, free offers, business opportunities and more can often be confused with, and filtered as, spam
And it really is all about spam. Chances are that your email provider, Hotmail in this case, is simply being overly aggressive about filtering spam. (And unfortunately in doing so, there are actually reasonable arguments for not sending a bounce message - many spammers actually rely on bounce messages to either legitimize an email address, or to actually carry their spam message.)
So, what can you really do?
Aside from what I've listed so far, nothing.
I wish that email providers, particularly the free ones, gave you more direct control over what is, and is not, spam to you. Truly paying attention to your address book would go a long way to solving the issue, but as you can see that's not happening consistently.
So what's the one thing to do that I said you won't like?
Use a different email provider.
Stop using Hotmail.
Find an email provider that is more responsive to its customers needs. GMail currently appears to be the best of the free services, but email reliability is also worth paying for, if that's what it takes.
Article C3382 - May 14, 2008 « »
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
July 15, 2010 1:15 AM
Please help me my email: [email address removed] isnt getting any emails and i get many per day, i have to confirm my world of warcraft account but cant, please help me
July 19, 2010 5:32 AM
i need to get my mail daily!
October 11, 2010 4:42 AM
Plz help me i can't get mail on this accounts. I am facing this problem since couple of weeks.
11-Oct-2010
October 22, 2010 4:55 PM
Please give me back my live .com account !
24-Oct-2010
August 9, 2012 5:44 AM
actaul reason behind of that is u r email pop settings didnt match u r mail dns. that was the problem. due to this cause no need to delete u r hotmail account it will receives emails surely. u just do one thing -> go to the options ->choose mail options-> in that window choose manage your account->click the create an alias name -> create one alias name and lets check ...u will get emails surely....no doubt at all. for more information contact {url removed}
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