Unable to receive sister-in-law's e-mails

[Naturalized-Texan]

We have been unable to receive e-mails originated by my sister-in-law for the past 3 or 4 months. She is sending them but we don't receive them and they are not being returned to her. However, when she replies to an e-mail we send, we receive them. Her server people say that our server has to be the problem, but as far as we know, we are receiving e-mails from everyone else with no problem.

Any ideas?

[Suzie]

She might have got on some spammer list and your ISP is blocking her.

[Naturalized-Texan]

She might have got on some spammer list and your ISP is blocking her.
Then why do we receive her replies? We did receive one and only one e-mail she originated a couple of weeks ago right after she talked to her server people. That made me think that her server people did something to get it through without telling her or admitting that they had a problem.

[DoctorDoom]

Spam blocking is quite possible. What ISPs are you and she using? Have you contacted your ISP asking if her email address is blocked?

You might suggest to her to fetch AdAware and/or Spybot and look for unwanted digital lifeforms. Also do a complete virus scan with the latest definitions. If her box is infected with a trojan, it might be serving as a zombie sending out spam without her knowledge. It's better to be sure that nothing evil is on her computer than to be unaware that something IS there.

Until it's resolved, have her reply to one of yours to send her messages, erasing the content and changing the subject. It will still be treated as a reply.

[Suzie]

My spam program lets me receive from people I contact, but if they send me something unsolicited and are on a spammer list it blocks it. I had to change an Email once because someone hijacked my email and sent a bunch of stuff out as spam and then I couldn't contact people I needed to communicate with for my web business.

[Rhino]

Get a free online e-mail account with somebody like Hotmail. Then have her send mail there. Forward the mail from the Hotmail account to your ISP account. If you receive it, the problem is almost certainly with your ISP, and not hers.

Something else you might try. Most ISPs allow a certain number of e-mail addresses on each account. If you can get them to add another e-mail address to your existing account, have your SIL send mail there. That might narrow things down.

[Naturalized-Texan]

Spam blocking is quite possible. What ISPs are you and she using?
I have no idea what her ISP is. My ISP changes every time I boot up.

[Rhino]

How does your ISP change when you boot up?

[Rhino]

I believe you're thinking of IP, not ISP. An ISP (Internet Service Provider) is somebody like Earthlink, NetZero or AOHell. Your ISP does not change at boot-up.

If you have AOHell, I probably can't help you. Their setup defies logic.

[Naturalized-Texan]

I believe you're thinking of IP, not ISP. An ISP (Internet Service Provider) is somebody like Earthlink, NetZero or AOHell. Your ISP does not change at boot-up.

If you have AOHell, I probably can't help you. Their setup defies logic.
OK, you're correct. I was confused.

Her ISP is salsgiver.com - Mine is sbcglobal.net

[Rhino]

The reply nuance is interesting. I wonder if she prefaced her next subject line with "RE:", if you would receive it. If a filter is involved, maybe the "RE:" has something to do with it. Sounds pretty strange to me, but it might be worth a try.

[Naturalized-Texan]

I have a free Yahoo e-mail account, so I asked her to send me an e-mail there.

[Naturalized-Texan]

Get a free online e-mail account with somebody like Hotmail. Then have her send mail there. Forward the mail from the Hotmail account to your ISP account. If you receive it, the problem is almost certainly with your ISP, and not hers.
I had her send me an e-mail at my Yahoo account. I forwarded it to my sbcglobal account and it never arrived. To test it, I originated an e-mail from Yahoo to my sbcglobal account and it came instantly. Now what?

[gnome]

Now I'm almost certain it's a filter of some kind... something in the content is triggering their spam alert. You might ask your ISP to trace the one that didn't arrive...

[Rhino]

Agreed. It is your ISP or a filter of some sort.

[Naturalized-Texan]

Agreed. It is your ISP or a filter of some sort.
But you said, "If you receive it, the problem is almost certainly with your ISP, and not hers." So, if what you said is true, since I didn't receive it, so it must not be with my ISP.

[Rhino]

That was a typo. Sorry. Forwarding from your Yahoo account effectively takes her ISP out of the loop. That isn't guaranteed, but it's extremely likely.

The reply thing is still strange, though.

[Naturalized-Texan]

That was a typo. Sorry. Forwarding from your Yahoo account effectively takes her ISP out of the loop. That isn't guaranteed, but it's extremely likely.

The reply thing is still strange, though.
After I posted last, I discovered that my e-mail software - Mozilla Thunderbird - labeled her e-mail that I forwarded from Yahoo as Junk and relegated it to the Trash bin. However, when I originated an e-mail from Yahoo, it went immediately into my Inbox. So, there is still something unique in her e-mail - a spam tag or something - that is causing the problem.

EDIT: This morning (Friday) I told Mozilla Thunderbird that the above mentioned forwarded e-mail was not Junk. I then forwarded another of her e-mails from Yahoo to my regular e-mail address and it came through just fine immediately into my Inbox.

We have asked our other regular e-mail correspondents to originate e-mails to us and we received them with no problem. And as far as we know we receive all our other e-mails, even some that we don't really want.

Our middle son, who is our family computer guru, suggested that my provider has blacklisted her provider as a source of spam.

[Rhino]

I suspect your son is correct.

[Naturalized-Texan]

I suspect your son is correct.
I called my provider and I was told that they have no capability to blacklist other providers. She suggested I contact the Mozilla Thunderbird people with the problem. Thunderbird has a built-in spam filter, but I see no way to modify it.

[Rhino]

I don't know Thunderbird, so I can't help you there.

[Naturalized-Texan]

I got on the Mozilla Thunderbird Forum (similar to FC) and asked the question that started this thread. I got an answer that I should log into sbcglobal.yahoo mail (that I never use) and look in the Bulk (Spam) Folder where I found the e-mails from the past month from my sister-in-law as well as legitimate e-mails from a couple of other correspondents. There is a Spam Editor associated with that Bulk Folder which I used to teach the Spam Filter that those e-mails aren't spam. I think that will solve the problem. I guess I'll have to check into that folder periodically to see if there are other legitimate e-mails that sbcglobal thinks is spam.

EDIT It worked. We just got a new e-mail from her.

[DoctorDoom]

That's good to know. Do you have a link for that forum post? I'd like to save it for future reference.

Kudos on taking another step toward geekdom. :biggrin:

[Naturalized-Texan]

Here's a link to the Thunderbird Support Forum:

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewforum.php?f=39

Here's a link to my thread (I posted as RichVW):

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=579076

[Suzie]

So I was right, she got on a spammer list for some reason? Been there. :sad:

[Naturalized-Texan]

What was really annoying was that the woman at sbcglobal tech support didn't even know that sbcglobal had a spam filter that blocked suspected spam, including my sister-in-law's e-mails. When I looked in the sbcglobal.yahoo Bulk (spam) folder there were 476 e-mails there that had been blocked by its Spam Filter, and that was only for the past month or 6 weeks. I emptied out that Bulk (spam) folder last night and already there are 7 e-mails there, clearly spam.

At least as annoying was the fact that the woman spoke with such an accent that I could hardly understand what she was saying and I had to keep asking her to repeat what she said. I didn't even understand her when she told me her name.

[Naturalized-Texan]

So I was right, she got on a spammer list for some reason? Been there. :sad:
Yep!

[buckeyepete]

"At least as annoying was the fact that the woman spoke with such an accent that I could hardly understand what she was saying and I had to keep asking her to repeat what she said. I didn't even understand her when she told me her name."-- from Tex's link--

Tell me about it Tex. I've been dealing with Sprint for three months now over a billing problem, and those kinda people are the only ones you can speak to. I think their customer service center is in India.

[Naturalized-Texan]

Tell me about it Tex. I've been dealing with Sprint for three months now over a billing problem, and those kinda people are the only ones you can speak to. I think their customer service center is in India.
AT&T (sbcglobal's parent) has its tech support center in India. What is humorous is that they all have fake American names when they introduce themselves.

[Naturalized-Texan]

That's good to know. Do you have a link for that forum post? I'd like to save it for future reference.

Kudos on taking another step toward geekdom. :biggrin:
Actually, I was a geek before the word geek came into use. I knew more about science and math than anyone in my high school class and most of my college class. When I was a computer programmer when people had questions about the software we were using or had a bug they couldn't find, they came to me. Even now I'm the first level of tech support for the 2 sons who live in the area. Our middle son is the family guru, however.

[Timberwolf]

Ain't outsourcing grand?

[DoctorDoom]

When I was a computer programmer when people had questions about the software we were using or had a bug they couldn't find, they came to me.Good to know. I've got this sharp pain in my subroutine and my stack pointer won't decrement.

[gnome]

I don't terribly mind outsourced script-jockey tech support if they are capable of recognizing when I need support beyond the basics. Some seem to figure it out, some seem to pretend that no such need could ever exist.

[Naturalized-Texan]

Ain't outsourcing grand?
Outsourcing isn't the problem. The problem lies with the American companies' lax hiring criteria that the contractors' must hire call center employees who speak clear English and the enforcement of those criteria.

[Timberwolf]

If we kept those jobs HERE, that wouldn't really BE a problem, now would it?

Go on, rant and rave about "free trade" and "open markets", kvetch and kvittle all ya want. Yer busted and ya know it.

[Naturalized-Texan]

If we kept those jobs HERE, that wouldn't really BE a problem, now would it?
Keeping those low-paying menial jobs here would seriously harm our economy by preventing American companies from employing more and more Americans in high-paying jobs. The ability to outsource low-paying menial jobs has greatly enhanced our economic growth and has reduced unemployment to to the full-employment levels.

Go on, rant and rave about "free trade" and "open markets", kvetch and kvittle all ya want. Yer busted and ya know it.
Maybe some day you will learn enough economics so that you won't be so easily fooled by labor union propaganda. Your first steps should be to study Free to Choose by Milton and Rose Friedman and Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell. Those 2 books will go a long way towards helping you resist labor union propaganda.

[DoctorDoom]

Outsourced tech support would be no problem if, as has been mentioned, the people were at least semi-skilled in English and actually had a clue about the systems they are assigned to support.

And the background sound of boats on the Ganges is really distracting.

Perhaps one reason we can't get good domestic tech support people was inadvertently delineated by N-T: "Keeping those low-paying menial jobs here ..."

When a company considers customer support "low-paying menial jobs", what the hell can it expect in terms of qualified staff? If it has so little regard for its customers that it's "support" for them is barely above coolie labor, the company is f'ing itself. One major reason why people switch companies is pathetically bad support.

I'm on HughesNet satellite Internet. I've never had to call tech support, thank human. The horror stories abound. And many other companies are also notorious for "just shut up and send us your payments" customer service.

To be sure, many of those who call support with a gripe are idiots. They are the PEBKAC customers—Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair—that become legends, e.g., the ones with the broken coffee-cup holder and the power strip plugged into itself. But there are also legitimate calls about legitimate issues, and they should expect to talk to competent personnel.

If companies regard their support division as "low-paying menial jobs", they're cutting their own economic throats. A dissatisfied (or pissed off) customer is not a repeat customer, and they can get really vocal about why no one else should bother with the company.

Best approach: offer competitive wages and treat the service techs with respect. They're the ones that deal with customers after the sale, and they can influence profitability for better or worse.

[gnome]

It could also be pointed out that it's not just the low paying jobs getting outsourced. of course, they're low-paying once they ARE outsourced.

[Naturalized-Texan]

It could also be pointed out that it's not just the low paying jobs getting outsourced. of course, they're low-paying once they ARE outsourced.
Not at all. They are low-paying jobs here, but when they're outsourced, they are even lower-paying jobs, thus freeing up capital with which to hire more American skilled workers into higher-paying jobs.

However, that is moot because there are more and higher-paying jobs being insourced into the U.S. than are being outsourced out of the U.S. - e.g., foreign auto makers building their cars in the U.S. with American workers. However, the labor union propagandists don't want the American people to know about those jobs because they are non-union jobs.

[gnome]

My position on it isn't cemented yet. The phenomenon troubles me, but I'm reluctant to jump on a protectionist bandwagon. So for now I'll absorb what you're saying too and keep an eye on the big picture.

[Naturalized-Texan]

I guess my complaints about not being able to understand the AT&T call center agents worked:

AT&T brings 175 jobs back to U.S. (http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/5149921.html)

San Antonio-based AT&T announced plans Wednesday to bring 175 call center jobs once outsourced overseas back to the United States, part of a group of 5,000 outsourced jobs company officials plan to fold back into its operations.

The new call center, to be located at AT&T Arkansas' headquarters in Little Rock, will help callers who have AT&T Yahoo High Speed Internet services.