Does not like recipient

[Lilladancer]

Okay... I'm prepared to feel stupid. What does "Does not like recipient" mean in an email failure notice?

I have a mailing list of several hundred for my classes (they all voluntarily signed up for it), and I like to weed out as many bad email addresses as I can. Sometimes certain people's emails will result in a failure notice one time, but then they are fine again the next, depending on what the reason was for the failure notice. I don't want to delete them if it's a temporary problem, but I do want to delete if it's a permanent one, to pare down my list.

In my mind, "recipient" would mean the person I sent the email to. But now I'm wondering if "recipient" means the sender, and if this means that my email is being rejected as spam or has been blocked. Students can ask to be taken off the list at any time, but I'm wondering if some people are embarrassed to ask and just block it instead.

Any insights from techies out there?

[wigglewhiz]

Mmmm, to my mind "recipient" would definitely indicate a problem with the receiving email address, not yours. I'm trying to think if I've ever had a response like that from my own mailing list, and I think I've had something *very* similar.

Is this the first time you've had it from this person? If it is, I'd leave it on your list. If not, I'd probably delete them. I think date-bound e-mail addresses (e.g. Hotmail, where you need to check your Inbox every 60 days or such to keep the account) can return this type of error message to senders when the recipient is currently inactive.

Um... OK, I'm guessing rather than knowing.

[Lilladancer]

Well thanks for at least helping me guess! Yes, often times I get a whole slew of hotmail addresses that bounce back, and when I re-send them they go through. Or other times it's a bunch of yahoo accounts, so then it seems obvious that it's a temporary problem.

I've had a few times when the message says "sender has been blocked" and then I know it's someone too chicken to ask to be taken off the list, but I was just wondering if "does not like recipient" was the same deal. But perhaps "does not like recipient" just refers to the fact that communication between the servers could not occur, without necessarily providing a reason?

[Lilladancer]

Oh - forgot to answer the question.... every time I send out to the entire list, I get a few failure notices. Some are first timers, some are repeat. Sometimes I make a note of them without deleting them, and if it happens again when I send out another class schedule a few weeks later, I delete them. But I was hoping that by understanding the messages better, I could discern whether I should bother making notes and trying again, or just delete on the first go...

[danidance]

There's a problem with the recipient's address (of your email). They've changed providers (so much moving around between the free emails gmail, msn, etc.) or if you're using work emails, may have left their job.

You have my work email on your list and I think occasionally you might get a bounce from me because my inbox is full. But, it wouldn't say "does not like recipient" - it will say "could not deliver recipient address is full" - or something like that.

[azahara]

Spam kick back , when you try to send multiple emails to yahoo or Gmail or hotmail they kick it out as mass mailing (spam) .

[steffib]

I found that putting error messages into parantheses, and then googling for the string is a most useful exercise. That has been a real life saver in the days when I was admin for a Unix system.

[Lilladancer]

I found that putting error messages into parantheses, and then googling for the string is a most useful exercise. That has been a real life saver in the days when I was admin for a Unix system.

Ooh.. thanks for the tip!