Q: IOS7 iPhone emails disappearing, are not delivered

Can anyone try to isolate the problem to poor connectivity? is it possible that in some rare cases the iOS 'thinks' that it's connected to the internet (poor coverage, expired hot-spot session, wifi with inconsistent internet connection, etc.) so instead of saving the message to the Outbox folder for later delivery, it starts to send it to the outgoing server (which receives partial or no data at all), clears it from the drafts folder (if it was already saved there) and that's it. The sent message is never saved to the sent folder on the device by design so it looks to me like it's a very low level system communication bug in the iOS where sent mesages are not correctly verified to be delivered.

What's more interesting to me is that it happens on multiple protocols, such as SMTP, IMAP and ActiveSync, where the end result is the same.

Thoughts?

Avi

Its not poor connectivity.  My users are in NYC where connectivity is pretty good.  And while in the office, they are connected via WiFi. And yes, I've seen it happen in SMTP and ActiveSync (Exchange).

Thanks Joe.

I'm supporting about 20 iPhones 4/5/5s users running iOS 6 and 7 and so far in the past 3 years I got less than 10 complaints from 5 different users, mostly when located outside the office. Granted, there must be more cases where the users didn't know and didn't report about the issue.

How often does it happen to your users?

A FIX!  i have been dealing with this issue for weeks and driving me crazy.  I may have cracked it yesterday.  Worth saying, I have 3 email accounts in addition to my Exchange account.  Here is what worked.  I put the device to factory defaults and then restored the required configuration (This configuration was from some weeks back after I had upgraded to iOS7 and after I noticed the delay with email delivery).  After the restore process started and it gave me access to the iPhone, I went in and removed all other email accounts one at a time, except for the Exchange account.  Amazingly, the Exchange started to work fine and the delivery delay was gone.  Now, I went back in and started to add the other email accounts back in.  At this point, all is working fine.  Good luck. 

Note, it was KEY to take the device back to factory defaults prior to restoring.  I tried restoring while another config was already on the iPhone and the problem did not get cleared...

I have a new 5s that came loaded with iOS7.4 and I am having the same issues as everyone else.

When I try to send a email from the Apple installed mail app, new emails being sent vanish without a trace. I am using this unit as a personal/business device. So I don't want to spam people with almost the same email because of this issue. It really freaks me out that when I check the actual email site I see the draft, but after sending its like it never existed.

I would try the above fix, but I just received the device. So I'm not sure if restoring to the default settings of a couple days ago will fix this frustrating issue. I must say that switched from a Blackberry to this iPhone. And now I'm regretting the switch. I am a HEAVY email user, so this issue could be a deal breaker. I will give it chance, but after seeing 9 pages of my issue with no response from Apple except for the initial response of deleting and reinstalling, which everyone says works for about 10 days then it reverts back to the same issue.

My fix for now is to download the actual email site app, for me it's Gmail. I will try running everything though that app instead of using the Apple installed mail app. My fingers are crossed that this bypass will work. I will update this post if the problem persists. I will also continue to check here to see if Apple ever decides to fix this frustrating issue.

Good luck all.

I've been following this thread for many months, and I don't believe there is a fix.  There is no problem until you turn on/off one of your email accounts.  Doing so causes the email app to get confused regarding outgoing authentications.  The only workaround that I consider to be dependable is; (1) turn on/of the desired email accounts and (2) reboot the phone.  Then everything works fine until I want to turn on/off an email account again.  (This problem did not exist under iOS6) Pete

Deleting ALL email accounts on my iPad Mini is the only thing that worked for me.

I spent about 48 hours trying to troubleshoot this myself. I restored the iPad from a backup; then wiped the iPad and restored from a backup; deleted the several icloud accounts that were not working. All these strategies failed. Then I called customer support, got escalated, and they advised deleting and reentering all email account data. Apparently, once this flaw manifests itself, the mail system on the device (including non-iCloud POP accounts) completely stops working.

I'll just say this: same thing happened to my iPhone last Fall. It's an extremely troubling problem.  Unless you think to go back to make sure your emails are going through, the only way you learn of the problem is when you discover that a colleague never received your email or, worse, that a critical action or decision was not taken because no one got your message. It really can't get worse than that, can it? Apple does not seem to grasp that this failure undermines the product's credibility for people who rely on the devices for important communications.

Hello, Apple?

PS Related problem: Apple's servers filter out legitimate email and treat it as spam. Again, you have no idea what you are missing. Apple refuses to provide its filter list, or provide any way to easily get the filters removed.

OK Apple, I've pretty much had enough of being ignored, your complete and utter lack of interest and response to this serious issue is beyond a joke, for a company who bangs on about customer care, customer experience, and all that other waffle is now making me sick.

It's evident that you don't care.

I lost more work yesterday as my email confirming a contract did not get to my customer, and they gave the work to another engineer.

I have a a solution that I have been trying for a few days now and it works, but Apple are not going to be happy (but as they don't care about me I don't care about them).  I have downloaded Microsoft OWA, and in 1 click I have full access to our hosted exchange server/ office365 server, and so far I have had no problems.

What amuses me in this is apple normally works well on Microsoft platforms, it now seems t be the other way, Microsoft performs better on apple platforms.

I am only using iPads and iPhones because they have a reputation for just working, this is no longer the case.  I am due to upgrade my phone and iPad next month, and guess what apple, it wont be on of you products.  Another example of a loyal Apple customer moving to Samsung or maybe Microsoft surface2.

APPLE, if you keep this up, you will shortly have no customers.  This combined with apple copying the competition, when historically they copied you only confirms Apple have lost their edge for innovation.

Definitely a bug. Can't seem to find a section to report this bug. Interesting how the Apple community moderator just dissappeared. DavRac...well said...pathetic and appaling service.

Looks like it maybe a bug with ios 7 and maybe iphone 5(s) as my partner has ios 7 installed on a 5c and this does not seem to be a problem. That said, it seems some iphone 4 users also seem to have this issue.

It's so sad to see how buggy their code has got ever since Tim Cook has taken over. He has got to be the worst CEO. Poor Steve Jobs...probably turning in his grave.

Apple - stop releasing stuff in such a hurry. We'd much rather have stable functionality that we can rely on than cool stuff (sending an email!!!) that is a crap shoot.

It is silly but the problem disappears when I restart my phone or my e-mail app. However after some time the problem comes back again. I always copy now the whole mails before sending them and check if the mail appears in "sent mails". If they don't appear there I paste them into my notes restart the app and my phone. This is not funny!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FIX: I was able to get all my email accounts sending fine by disabling Keychain in iCloud settings on all my iOS and OSX devices.

Good luck!

I also then removed the Exchange account and re-added it.  Now all accounts work.

Only realized this morning that I have been experiencing this same problem.

Deleting all my mail accounts and recreating them from scratch seems to have resolved it. Thumbs up to everyone who recommended this.

Apple is definitely monitoring this thread: it appears to me that an angry post on this topic was deleted on Saturday. I'm curious how serious the impact is on consumers and businesspeople.

Harvey Rosenfield

Consumer Watchdog

Los Angeles, CA

So my solution that I tried back in January has seemed to fix the issue. I have had no, I repeat NO MORE issues with my emails since trying the bypass solution below. By installing the actual email apps from Google, Yahoo and etc and turning off the Mail app in Settings. The vanishing emails issue has vanished. The only downside is that the ability to call phone numbers from emails has been disabled by using this BYPASS solution. In my opinion, I would rather send and receive emails with confidante than have the ability to call from an email. Because uninstalling and reinstalling my email every 10 days or so seems more troublesome than helpful. But everyone of course can make their own decision on what they want to do.

"My fix for now is to download the actual email site app, for me it's Gmail. I will try running everything though that app instead of using the Apple installed mail app. My fingers are crossed that this bypass will work. I will update this post if the problem persists. I will also continue to check here to see if Apple ever decides to fix this frustrating issue."