"Warning: could not message for past four hours" message

I get the following message back when sending mail to another .mac account, even though the message I sent has been delivered. A similar message also shows up in the mail program of Windows and Mac users when they try to send an email to my .mac account, always referencing "seller@gold-shopbizz.co.uk". Their email actually comes through to me, but they think it has not because they get this weird message saying that their email is not delivered. It's getting almost impossible to use my .mac account because of this problem. Is there any way to prevent this short of not using my .mac account?

Here's a copy of the error message.

Thanks!

jwulf



From: MAILER-DAEMON@mac.com
Subject: Warning: could not send message for past 4 hours
Date: September 19, 2007 10:05:52 PM EDT
To: slswulf@comcast.net

********************************************
** THIS IS A WARNING MESSAGE ONLY **
** YOU DO NOT NEED TO RESEND YOUR MESSAGE **
********************************************

The original message was received at Wed, 19 Sep 2007 14:18:17 -0700 (PDT)
from mail044-e1000g351000 [10.150.72.44]

----- Transcript of session follows -----
451 gold-shopbizz.co.uk: Name server timeout
Warning: message still undelivered after 4 hours
Will keep trying until message is 1 week old
Reporting-MTA: dns; smtpout.mac.com
Arrival-Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2007 14:18:17 -0700 (PDT)

Final-Recipient: RFC822; seller@gold-shopbizz.co.uk
Action: delayed
Status: 4.4.3
Last-Attempt-Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2007 19:05:52 -0700 (PDT)
Will-Retry-Until: Wed, 26 Sep 2007 14:18:17 -0700 (PDT)

iMac, Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Posted on Sep 25, 2007 9:00 AM

Reply
6 replies

Sep 25, 2007 2:09 PM in response to jwulf

Please, read what the message says:

********************************************
** THIS IS A WARNING MESSAGE ONLY **
** YOU DO NOT NEED TO RESEND YOUR MESSAGE **
********************************************

It’s just a warning that there is a transient problem somewhere but the SMTP server will keep trying and the message will probably end up being delivered nevertheless...

Sep 25, 2007 2:16 PM in response to jwulf

If you go to
http://www.apple.com/support/dotmac/
you will note that the .mac site email status shows amber rather than green indicating an issue
There is also a message
members may intermittently receive error message "Your message could not be sent. Please try again later" when attempting to send email via Webmail. Normal service will be restored ASAP.

Sep 25, 2007 4:16 PM in response to imac007

Unfortunately this is not an intermittent problem; it has been happening for months on a constant basis. I can live with the fact that I get this message back (shouldn't have to), but others who send me email are convinced that their emails are not getting through, since they get a similar message. They have resorted to calling me on the phone instead of using email because they have no confidence that their email is being delivered to me. There is no issue with my Comcast account, so it must be .mac related. Very annoying to actually pay for an email account and not have it work properly.

Jim W

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"Warning: could not message for past four hours" message

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