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Credentials are good. Provider says per their logs Mail fails to pass credentials properly, so connection times out.
Please advise.
iMac 27″, macOS 10.15
I am sorry I can not tell you to do something specific to fix the problem. It could be due to the email server not "answering" soon enough to receive the information. If you use a browser to access the email provider's server, does it answer immediately?
After considerable diagnostic work with the email provider, they report " the mail client did not pass a username, and again the connection times out after about a minute."
The Apple Mail behavior has now become worse: "The connection to host XXX.YYY.com on port 993 failed" appears nearly continuously. Mail doesn't pass my credentials in a timely way.
At least they told you what the problem was from their perspective. It would seem that in your Mail app, there needs to be some corrections. And all email hosts will time out after a short period of time of waiting to receive the correct information on which to complete a connection. As I was saying, most providers will actually work with you to get things done to resolve the connection problem. Apparently your provider won't. Here is what I suggest. With your browser, go to their web site and confirm (exactly) what your account number is, what account name is expected, what password is expected and write it all down. (I always keep a log of those things.) Then you can go back and see exactly how you have your Mail app set up. Remember, one incorrect stroke is enough to cause the problem. It seems clear to me that your Mail app is sending the server some incorrect information, so no connection is made.
I have spent over a week getting continuous, excellent support from my mail host. My credentials are correct, I have uninstalled the accounts, shut down and restarted my Mac, and reinstalled the accounts with all the correct information. The provider has reviewed the server-side logs and confirms that Mail disconnects from the server and does NOT send the credentials in a TIMELY fashion when I try to reconnect. None of the other users on our domain has any problems like this.
Based on that experience, I turned to the Apple community for help in dealing with a macOS application problem.
Thank you for that information which you did not provide earlier. All any of us have to go on is what you share with us. The next step is one most others would also recommend. It helps to get a bigger picture of things which may be happening in your computer and which may cause interactions. If you would, download, install and run the free app EtraCheck. Be sure to allow full disk access for access to maximum information. It is written by a long time supporter of this blog. The report can then be posted below under Additional text. That often shows some things which may be causal. Let's hope that proves useful.
Incidentally, just to see what happens, you might consider installing an additional email app such as Thunderbird. (It's free and I use it.) Then try sending a couple of test messages to see if the same thing happens.
Well, just after you replied, my Macintosh HD crashed hard. Couldn't even start up. Took two days to wipe the drive, run Disk Utility to ensure it was OK, then recover from a CCC clone. Got everything going again, but missing a few files modified just before the crash. Update my EntreCheck, ran it, and got a clean bill of health, as one might expect. The problem with those two accounts remains. The weird thing is that two other email accounts work fine on Mail. Haven't tried an alternative email app yet.
Apple Mac Mail keeps dropping email connection.
