Knowledgebase

• Mail Client Software Cannot Connect To Server:  If your Mail Software gives ""cannot connect to server" error, then either you are using the incorrect Mail Server Name or Port, OR you have been Fire-walled by the server. To verify Firewall log into your Account and if you see a firewall notice it will tell you why you were fire-walled and automatically unblock you. If you are NOT Fire-walled, confirm that you're using the correct Email Client Settings and that you're using FULL email account names ie: account@domain.com. If your settings are correct then your local computer firewall or ISP may be blocking access. Set your local firewall to permit SMTP ports 25 & 587 & 465, POP port 110 & 995, IMAP port 143 & 993 and try again or try switching to a different port. If you still cannot connect to the server, go to the Tools section and follow instructions for running a local Trace-route from your computer to the mail server and paste the Trace-route output into a support ticket.
  
  
• Webmail Won't Display:  Access your webmail by going to webmail.yourdomain . If the actual webmail interface won't open then you are probably fire-walled. To verify try going to your main website if it displays then you know your NOT firewalled.  If you are Firewall log into your Account portal at my.lowesthosting.com and go to the support / Unblock IP Address menu and to confirm and unblock the firewall.  
  
  
  Webmail Displays But Won't Access Password:  Most likely your using the wrong password or if you are using a browser to auto fill it may have incorrect password stored.  Passwords are case sensitive so the password must be entered exactly as it was originally set. If you are not sure what your password is, log into your cPanel, click on the Email Account Icon and in the list of existing email names locate your email account and click the change password link to reset a new password and retry.
  
  
• Failed Email Login:  Make sure you're using full email names ie: info@yourdomain.com vs just info. To verify correct email password use webmail.yourdomain. If it works there, then checkEmail Client Settings in cPanel. If the Email / Password doesn't work in Webmail, go into cPanel / Email, locate the account and use the "change password" option to update the password.
  
  
• Inbound Email Not Being Received: Non receipt of email generally falls into 4 reasons:

  1. The mail never hit your server: This can be due to the sender making a typo and not sending to your actual email address or the senders server not accepting it from them because it has a large attachment exceeding their sending size limit or has an illegal attachment type such as an executable or virus since the email was never actually sent by the senders mail server it never hits your server it will not appear in your inbound spam logs.

  2. Email is Dropped by your server due to it being classified as junk)  check your spam filter pro mail logs to identify how the email was processed.  If it was classified as junk and dropped whitelist the sender and have them resend it

  3. Email is scored as SPAM: Inbound email is analyzed by the Spam Assassin Engine to determine if its on a Real time Black List RBL, or the sending mail server is not the authorized seder specified in their SPF record or where the email contains words or phrases that match spam signatures or contain irregular ratios of images to text are marked as "SPAM" and either put into your inbox or spam folder depending upon your spam configuration setting.
  
  You should log into your cPanel and click on the Spam Assassin icon in the mail section and SEARCH for the senders email, if it is there and marked "HAM" you know it is on your server inbox. If it is marked DROPPED you should click the link to whitelist it and ask the sender to resend it. If it is marked "SPAM" you should click the link to whitelist and locate the spam in your spam folder. Note if you use POP3 and are not popping the spam folder you can log into your webmail at webmail.yourdomain to view the spam folder and move the mail from the spam folder to your inbox.

• 4. Your Email Box is Full or Set to Restricted:  Log into your cPanel and verify the mailbox has not filled with mail to the point its at or exceeded its set quota.  If the mailbox is showing at quota it will display a red indicator and mail sent to it will defer or bounce back to the sender.  Simply set the quota higher or delete emails to open up more space.  If your account is set to RESTRICTEd then it will not accept inbound email.
• Cannot Send or Receive: Mailbox Quota Full, log into cPanel / Email and increase quota on effected account(s)
  
  Blocked For Pop3 Access: Your email software is set to connect too frequently to the server to check email or you are manually over-checking your email. Your server will permit up to 80 pop3 connections per hour from any given IP address. If you have many email accounts or many computers all checking email frequently you can exceed this limit triggering a temporary firewall block which will reset in an hour. Solution log into your account to reset the firewall, then either change to IMAP method which permits more or continuous connection to the mail server OR set your mail software to auto check every 5 or 10 minutes instead of every minute.
• Software or Device Asks for Password: You are likely using the wrong password, verify your password via webmail.yourdomain or log into cPanel/Email. Select the affected email account and click the "change password" link to reset your password.
• Lost Email Password: Email passwords are encrypted and can not be retrieved however you can reset them to a new password by logging into your cPanel, click the Email Icon and select the "change password" option for the email account you desire.
• Email In Webmail Disappears: If you are using POP to download emails from the server, they will disappear from Webmail. Solution: set your software from POP to IMAP method which will download a COPY of the email but leave the original email on the server so it will continue to be visible from Webmail.
• Mail Sent Via Mailing List Not Received :  If mail is being accepted by your other recipients, ask the specific recipient to whitelist your email address. Bulk Mailers exceeding 200 emails per hour limit will be blocked. Use App Installer script installer to install mailing list program and throttle rate to 200/hour see.
  
  
• 503 Error Valid RCPT Command Must Precede DATA :  This error occurs when you are attempting to send email but the actual email name and password hitting the server is not correct. It occurs in cases where the email client software is caching the credentials from another email account that was previously used. The solution is to check the check box in your mail software that says "check mail before sending", which will force a new credential lookup and should clear the cache. Make sure SMTP my server requires authentication is enabled.
  
  
• Setting Iphone or Blackberry:  Allow auto setup to fail (may take 2-3 minutes) then enter settings manually. (settings can be found next to each email account by clicking on the "configure mail client" .
  
  
• Max Defers & Failures Limit Reached: This error is triggered when an abnormal amount of email sent from your domain is not deliverable. You are permitted to send up to 200 emails per hour with a 10% deferral or failed limit. Recipients who are unreachable will be deferred for later delivery and emails that are refused because they don't exist are failed. If you exceed the 10% deferral/failure limit, the server's security system will put a temporary 1 hour block on sending email to anyone. It is common for spammers to exploit outdated or un-patched scripts or guess simple passwords, allowing the spammers to send spam as if they were a legitimate sender. Since spammers have a high percentage of failed deliveries, the ratio of failed/deferred mail to sent mail is one of the metrics used by the security system to trigger a blocking condition. This ratio is regardless of the quantity of mail sent and can be triggered whether you had3 out of 10 mails defer (30%) or 21 out of 200 (10.1%) non deliverables per hour. Solution: If your are sending email to a recipient that keeps deferring / refusing your email stop sending and contact the recipient and ask their mail administrator to stop blocking / deferring or dropping your email.   if your are sending bulk email to an opt in list within our bulk mail policy guidelines, you should make sure you clean your mailing list. If you are not sending bulk email then check each of your email accounts for a large amount of returned/bounced emails which is an indicator that the email account was likely compromised and being used by a spammer and you should reset the email passwords.
  
  
• Someone Sending Email To You Gets Returned:  Bounce Messages means your server has refused someone's email and sent it back to them as non deliverable and will generally include a reason. Often this is due to the sender making a simply typing error. All email that actually reaches your server is logged in your Spam Assassin Mail Logs where you may confirm how it was processed and notify the sender to change their action that is triggering the refusal.
  
  
• Mail Attachment Is Returned:  Make sure your attachment is not ending in .exe or .js as most email servers will consider them a virus and block them. Make sure you don't attach files larger than 25mb in size as most ISPs will not accept them. Instead upload your attachment to your server using the file manager or ftp and attach a download link to your email, or put them into a password protected directory and supply both the download link and password.
• Slow or Non Receipt:  We monitor our mail servers to insure they have a good sending reputation and that the mail queue for each server is processing quickly and not filling up causing delays.  Email is dynamic, the mail queue of the mail server operates serially one mail after another and includes all inbound and outbound emails of of other users can vary depending upon time of day and overall mail traffic but rarely has more than a few hundred mails in it meaning inbound / outbound  occurs in under a minute and we monitor our mail queues for any problems so we almost always know of a problem before you will and your server shows no history of mail queue size / delays. We can never guarantee acceptance of outbound email because the recipient may have filters or rules blocking or grey-listing you which adds delays  but we can certainly assist you to validate that outbound email is being sent within under a minute of when your mail system submits it
  
  Allowable Emails Per Hour Has Been Exceeded: Your mail server permits a maximum of 200 emails per hour. This is the total number of emails that can be sent from all email accounts on the server as well as any email scripts such as form to email submissions. If you are getting email bounce messages that indicate you have reached or exceeded the limit, it means either you are sending too many emails for that hour or one or more of your email account passwords is compromised and spammers are using it to connect to the server to send Spam Email OR there is a form to email script or other scripting on your server is being exploited to send Spam.
  
  You should first check the inbox for ALL of the email accounts setup on the server and if you see one with a large number of bounces that look like spam that was SENT from the account and returned back as non deliverable will let you know that email accounts password was guessed by the spammer and you should change the password to a new secure one. If all your accounts appear normal then please open a support ticket and provide all details.

PROBLEM RECEIVING EMAIL FROM A SPECIFIC SENDER:

Areas you should check first:

1.  Have you confirmed the issue is only effecting a single email or forwarder ?

2.  If the issue is a forwarder, change the forward to target to a different email address .  If the inbound email IS received at the new address it means your servers forwarding mechanism is working but the recipient target email address is refusing your emails and you should have them whitelist your email address.

3.  If the recipient email is a Mailbox did you verify its set to Active and not restricted  (find this in your cpanel email section) ? if restricted set to allow inbound mail.

4.  If the recipient email is a Mailbox did you verify it is not over Quota ?  ( find this in your cpanel email section if over quota use the email disk usage option to remove old emails and / or  set the quota higher or unlimited.

5. Did you check your Spam Filter Pro inbound mail logs to identify if the mail was actually accepted by the server and if so how it was Categorized ?

   A)  If categorized as HAM it was received and routed to your inbox 
   B)  If categorized as SPAM it will be in your Imap Spam Folder unless you set your routing to delete or Inbox.
   C)  If Dropped it was not accepted by the server and you will need to whitelist the sender in your Spam Filter and ask the sender to resend a new email.

NOTE:  Even if you turn your Spam Filter Sensitivity to OFF  only effects scoring and threshold for the Spam Assassin portion of the filter but does not turn disable the connection level filters only a whitelist entry will do that.

6. Did you confirm the actual Sending Email Address ?   In many cases the actual sending email is relayed through a different email address than the Reply address.  You should CONFIRM the actual sending email address to insure you are whitelisting the correct sender. Ask the sender to send you an email to your server email address with a CC (carbon copy)  going to a NON SERVER based email such as yahoo or google and if you receive it at google or yahoo use the view raw option to view its headers and verify the sending email address and whitelist that sender or add a wildcard whitelist for the sender if they use a gateway.  For example the sender may use sendgrid or a cloud based email sending from 34343433.mary.jane@sendgrid.com  with a reply to mary.jane@acme.com   you can add a whitelist for 34343433.mary.jane@sendgrid.com  or a wildcard   for  *@sendgrid.com

If after reviewing the above settings if the problem persists you should then open a support ticket Subject:  Cannot Receive Email From X and provide the following details:

1.  Sending email address
2.  Date / time sent (from senders sent folder)
3. The recipient email address on your server
4. Is the recipient email address a Mailbox or Forwarder or Both (IF a Forwarder what is the target destination ? )
5. If the sender received an NDR (Non delivery response) bounce message from your server provide that information including the error code
6. Provide the headers from your test email above in step 6 so our staff can confirm the sending mail server.  If you had difficulty  ask the sender to resent to send a test email to your email with a cc to lowesthosting@gmail.com and provide the date / time / it was sent above  and we will locate the email if it was received and identify the sender from the headers for you.