Unable to use Mail with error "Update Your "Forward To" Address", on Mac mini.

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Level 1

25 points

Unable to use Mail with error "Update Your "Forward To" Address", on Mac mini.

For quite a while, I have been unable to use Mac Mail on my 2014 Mac mini Monterey 12.7.3 because when I open Mail (usually by accidentally clicking on a mailto), I get this warning box

(I rarely use Apple Mail, I use Gmail because Apple Mail was always crashing.)

I have been unable to find where this "Forward To" setting might be. There's no Hide My Email set up in iCloud. Apple Mail works (in its own natively limited way) on my iPhone SE2, my iPad mini 6, and my MacBook Air 2018.

When I get this error message on my Mac mini (Monterey 12.7.3), I can't do anything with Mail but force-quit it. This is very annoying.

The Mail accounts on the Mac mini (Monterey 12.7.3):

Mail Privacy settings:

How can I fix this and stop this annoying behavior and crippling of Apple Mail on this device?

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Mac mini, macOS 12.7

Posted on Mar 9, 2024 5:16 PM

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Answer 1

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Mar 10, 2024 5:15 PM in response to crabpaws

Ah poor guess on my part, you never mentioned which eMail provider.

For gMail, login to gmail.com in a browser, then...

Turn off automatic forwarding

On your computer, open Gmail using the account you want to stop forwarding messages from.
In the top right, click Settings See all settings.
Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab.
In the "Forwarding" section, click Disable forwarding.
At the bottom, click Save Changes.

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Answer 2

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Mar 10, 2024 10:12 PM in response to crabpaws

With a message composition window open in Apple Mail make the following menu selection:

View > Reply-To Address Field

Try erasing it there.

That works for a message-by-message basis. If you want to apply all the time there's a hack you can do this via Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.mail UserHeaders '{"Reply-To" = "reply-to@address"; }'

So I imagine the hack to undo it would be...

defaults write com.apple.mail UserHeaders '{"Reply-To" = ""; }'

Not sure, but Mail likely has to not be running.

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Answer 3

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Mar 10, 2024 6:30 PM in response to crabpaws

I don't know why it wasn't clear to me & I thought you were not using Mail at all‽

So, this only happens when using Safari?

Can you right click on the Mail to: link & copy it?

I guess you could make an AppleScript or Automator App to intercept the Mail to: link & open it where ever you do.

In Mail>Preferences>General, what is the default reader set to?

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Answer 4

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Mar 10, 2024 3:33 AM in response to crabpaws

Try logging into icloud.com in a browser, then...

https://www.idownloadblog.com/2019/01/28/set-up-icloud-email-forwarding/#:~:text=1)%20Head%20over%20to%20iCloud,and%20enter%20the%20forwarding%20address.

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Answer 5

crabpaws Author

Level 1

25 points

Mar 10, 2024 3:37 PM in response to BDAqua

I don't understand your suggestion. Why would I want all my mail from multiple e-mail accounts forwarded to one e-mail address? I don't have iCloud e-mail set up at all, why would I? I have Gmail accounts.

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Answer 6

crabpaws Author

Level 1

25 points

Mar 10, 2024 5:27 PM in response to BDAqua

Thanks for your effort. I've been quite specific that this problem is within Mac Mail. It has nothing to do with Gmail, and I don't want to turn off my forwarding within Gmail. My Gmail accounts are not being picked up by Mac Mail via POP or IMAP on my Mac mini desktop, which is where this bug occurs.

BDAqua wrote:

And I wouldn't want to have multiple accounts reply to one accout either, but that's how to disable it also if you can take a hint.

Sorry, I missed the hint. How would creating an iCloud e-mail address that I do not intend to use disable this annoying behavior in Mac Mail on my Mac mini desktop?

As I mentioned earlier, Mac Mail works (to the extent that it can work) without this annoying bug on my iPhone SE2 (current iOS), iPad 6 (current iOS), and MacBook Air (Catalina). The bug is probably in Monterey, and I cannot find the controls to which this warning box refers.

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Answer 7

crabpaws Author

Level 1

25 points

Mar 10, 2024 5:36 PM in response to BDAqua

This may make it clearer:

Any time I accidentally click on a mailto in Safari (dumbly, Safari does not permit mailto directed to Gmail), it opens a similar window in Mail. This Mail message window cannot be closed, even if I click on the OK button. Mail is unresponsive in this state (though I can change Mail Preferences). I have to force-quit Mail to get it to close. I have been unable to find the Hide My Email setting anywhere.

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