Not able to receive emails sent to myself...!

Question

Level 1

8 points

Not able to receive emails sent to myself...!

Hi

I have a really strange problem here. I am able to send and receive emails to anyone but myself...Everyone can receive my emails, but if I cc or bcc myself or send an email only to myself, it just disappears into cyberspace (the other recipients still receive it though I think)....Has anyone had this experience before or have any ideas on potential solutions...?

Let me know if you need any further information on my setup as this is the strangest thing!

Thanks
Andrew

iMac, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Oct 11, 2009 9:17 PM

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Answer 1

ahighfield Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 12, 2009 1:42 AM in response to Golden Shoes

Thanks for that. However, I am not sure if that is the issue - if I log onto to my email account through safari, I am able to send and receive my own emails (and they do appear in my inbox online). It is only when I send it through Mail that I cannot receive it (either with Mail or online), so it seems to me that Mail itself is doing something to block those emails that I am sending to myself. Also, of course, I have been able to send emails to myself through Mail previously...Very grateful if you could let me know if you think this changes your answer below and anything I could try to stop this from happening - I regularly like to copy myself onto emails. Thanks!

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Answer 2

Oct 11, 2009 9:24 PM in response to ahighfield

Greetings,

This is not atypical behavior; it's quite normal under most circumstances, and it all depends on who your email provider is. For example, if you were to send an email from your Yahoo! Mail account to the same account, you would not see it when you login to Yahoo!, nor would it ever be retrieved. At the same time, doing the same thing with a Gmail account, the email would show up in the web interface, but it would not be downloaded by Mail.

None of that affects others receiving your emails, just you, because those two services (and many others) consider an email sent to yourself to be invalid; that is, something that isn't going to be delivered to you.

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Answer 3

Oct 12, 2009 7:41 AM in response to ahighfield

so it seems to me that Mail itself is doing something to block those emails that I am sending to myself.

It's possible, but I doubt it, since Mail has no facility to check whether or not you sent an email to yourself and thus not download it from the server. The only possibility I can imagine that might prevent this is if your mailbox needs to be rebuilt, which you can do by selecting each account, one-at-a-time and then choosing Mailbox > Rebuild. You'd also have to do this for your Sent mailboxes as well.

Ultimately, your email provider controls this, and they're free to change the configuration of their system at any time, without telling you, so you should check with them to be sure.

When you send emails from Mail, there's no reason to send it to yourself, since the original is already in your Sent mailbox; there's no point in having two copies of the same thing.

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Answer 4

Oct 12, 2009 5:23 PM in response to ahighfield

I don't know if this applies to your situation, but here goes just in case it does. Ever since ATT started using Yahoo for email, many of my emails from myself (regardless of which of my email accounts sends it), are being dumped into the Spam folder. Therefore they are not making it through to me when my mail downloads. However, when I am using a non-ATT Yahoo email account, I don't have that problem. I am not a technical person, but I have learned that different Yahoo accounts behave differently. I never even thought to check the webmail Spam box, because it was never an issue with ATT until they converted to Yahoo, and I haven't found a solution yet. Additionally, when I use my non-ATT Yahoo account, I always receive emails sent to myself from that same account (they show up exactly where they are supposed to). So, if you haven't checked your Spam via webmail, maybe you'll find them there. If so, just Move them to your In box and they will download to Mail.

Good Luck.

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Answer 5

ahighfield Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 13, 2009 10:13 PM in response to Ernie Stamper

Thanks for all the responses and given there doesn't seem to be an easy solution, perhaps I should give more information (though I'm afraid this may not make it less complex!)

I have an email address through an old ISP in Australia. I now live in Hong Kong. I am accessing emails (with my old ISP account password) through the wireless network provided by our serviced apartment and send emails with their SMTP settings. Previously, with another local ISP in Hong Kong, this set up was working fine (ie I could send myself emails), but we have been away travelling for 10mths and just having arrived back, I wasn't sure if I have changed something inadvertently.

After a couple of weeks, it now seems that some random emails are not being received by certain recipients also...so based on your feedback, perhaps I need to talk to our building management to see if they can help, but this seems too complex to try and resolve through them - was hoping it was just a matter of a simple switch in Mail!!

But just to confirm, there is no inbuilt filter in Mail that might block outgoing mail based on user-defined conditions - I couldn't find anything except setting up a Rule (which obviously I haven't done)?

Appreciate all your time and comments.

Andrew

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Answer 6

Oct 14, 2009 4:54 AM in response to ahighfield

There is no filter in Mail to explain this behavior, but nearly every SMTP has filters these days -- they may have added something while you were away. I would suggest setting up an account with this apartment related ISP, and testing with it as the From, in addition to checking with them.

Ernie

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Answer 7

Oct 12, 2009 5:46 PM in response to ahighfield

Andrew,

This would be normal behavior if using Gmail, and sending with the Gmail SMTP. Who is the provider of your account?

Ernie

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