Comcast XFINITY → [E-mail] Port 587 Not Working--Sent Messages Not Recieved-HELP P

Hi All,

I run a small business out of my home which requires me to reach out to about 500-600 people per day over e-mail. I'm in charge of our mailing list. I use an add-on to Outlook called Send Personally, which will generate a separate message to each address, making it look more personalized. Comcast allows 999 people per 24-hour period, which works fine for me. Regardless of not going over their limit, they blocked me on port 25 after the first day of using my Comcast account with Outlook. I find that a lot of other folks are experiencing the same problem.

After some research, I switched the port to 587 and turned on Authentication. I tried the test message and it sent with no problem at all. So I should be fine, right?

Nope. No such luck.

Yesterday I went to send our newsletter out to about 550 clients and I put in my g-mail address to find out if I would get the letter too as a test. All of the messages sent and I never received anything. I also noticed that I didn't receive any out of office responses either, which is highly unlikely.

So in a sense, my messages are sent out, they go to the sent folder, but they're not being received.

Why is this happening?

Here's what makes my problem even more difficult to decipher: If I send an e-mail out to myself, just one at a time, I receive it fine.

Should I try a different SMTP port? I've seen that 465 might be an option as well.

Please advise,

Jack

Recommend you post in the email forum of the Comcast Customer Support Forums at »forums.comcast.net/comca ··· ard.id=2

You may also want to post the headers of your test messages in that forum for the messaging engineers to help you out with.

JL

Thank You, I'll post it there as well.

Does anyone else here have anything additional to add? Would changing to port 465 make a difference?

If you are referring to using a Comcast SMTP server, not likely. However, since you mention that you have a Gmail account, you might try following the instructions at »mail.google.com/support/ ··· er=13287 and try using the Gmail SMTP server on port 465 or 587 to see if that helps.

Yes, I am referring to a Comcast account. Here's the error I receive when I send a broadcast.

error (0x800CCC0F) : 'The connection to the server was interrupted.
If this problem continues, contact your server administrator or
Internet service provider (ISP).'

I tried switching the port to 465 last night, the test message sent just fine and I still received the above error.

WHAT IS CAUSING THIS?!?

Jack, check the Comcast forums. Your post was responded to by Heather and she has alerted you to a problem with your messages being deemed spam by the recipients.

Comcast can provide you more help on those forums than they can here.

I had a feeling that was the real problem.

mady

Your only quasi-legitimate option is to pay a hosting company to deliver mail for you. Comcast isn't going to let you spam on their residential service.

Or, if it is an actual business, pony up for the 'business class' service and run your own email server or not have to worry about an email limit.

Of course, if you are spamming (not that I am saying you are, mind you), they will still shut you down for it, but I'm all for any ISP shutting down spammers.

Not to threadjack or anything, but it never fails to surprise me the number of people who will try to run a business on a residential line and then complain, loudly, when they have downtime or some kind of issue.

When I worked for DirecTV DSL, I saw it often enough. They scream, they yell, they threaten lawsuits, to which we tapped the AUP and SA they agreed to when they signed up (but didn't bother to read).

To the OP: As someone who has had residential and business service and runs their own servers, trust me on this idea. Pay the extra for the business service. In the long run, it's much less of a hassle to run an online business using a business class connection.

Well, I'm not sure who they've received complaints from. None of my clients have complained to me. I didn't opt for the business class account because I thought the regular account offered 999 unique e-mails in a 24-hour period. I rarely eclipse that amount. Can anyone share what a business class account would offer me differently? Is it "unlimited usage"? I really don't need that, but if it will stop the huge blockage I've experienced, I would probably go forward with that.

I've had major downtime due to this problem and I'm just trying to get it figured out. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!

i dont have it so others may be able to provide better specifics. but here's a link
»www.comcast.com/corporat ··· s/Small/

Most people who think something is spam don't complain to the sender, they simply hit the "this is spam" button and make the problem go away without having to interact with anyone.

You probably need to sign yourself up for the Comcast FBL to track who's voting your mail spam and who isn't. This will help you with the business account too.

»feedback.comcast.net/

If he sends 500 messages a day, he's not the spammer anyone is looking for.

With 500 messages a day and getting "major down time," he needs professional help. I don't think Comcast Business is what he needs. He needs someone with special expertise in business email. That's not Comcast.That's fair and I think that's a very good test as to whether someone "needs" a business line of service.

Selling Avon or Amway, or pushing Entertainment Books for your social club, collecting donations for the Cancer Walk-a-thon -- these are business uses that are probably just fine for a residential line.

But if a business would feel great pain due to a couple of days of down-time, then it's probably more appropriate to get a business line with faster support expectations.Do you think an online business ought to run a website on a cable connection? It seems like an ill fitting architecture to me.

I would say that is a matter of perspective, if you are one of the 500+ that is on the mailing list and do not wish to be so, you would probably feel differently.

I know in my situation, I really didn't 'need' a business line of service, but as I wanted to run my own servers (mail, web, whatever), it was my only choice. Residential lines are limited as to what I can put on the line and due to my loop length, a DSL line just couldn't get the speeds I was wanting and needing.Overall, it is ill fitting. From the marketing material I have seen and read, Comcast business lines are not really meant for a 'mission critical' data connection, or a business past a certain size, it's design is better suited for something approaching a branch office or someone who wants/needs to run a few servers (mail, web, etc) on premise.

A dedicated line would be the preferred option. However, if the business is small enough or a DSL/dedicated line (T's and OC's are not cheap. Wish they were, I'd have one) isn't a viable option, the Comcast business line is a definite option, one just has to realize the limitations.

That's true -- I've actually have been that angry guy. But the cool-headed abuse desk should realize that spammers wouldn't even glance in the direction of a list with 500 addresses.

The naive sender may not practice good email practices -- may even violate newer legal requirements these days -- but he's not the guy that spam fighters try to kill. If you're an ISP spending any cycles tuning your filters to fight him, you've probably taken your eye off the ball.

Spammers are lazy and cheap and work in very high volume.

That said, at 500 messages a day, this guy does need to switch away from sending through Comcast. Call it the price of success.

comcast.net account allows 999 per 24 hour period and to expand on that only 99 per hour, if you go over that limit, you might be shutoff, there is a network abuse dept you can contact to remove the block.

It's amazing how many theories are out there on the limits and the results of hitting them.

Again, like many others, this is again not accurate.

my neighbor works for comcast, and according to him, the comcast.net are designed for residential email account and allow a max on 999 email per day and 99 per hour, that is straight from a level 3 email admin, so take it as you will.

Well...... for one, we don't have any "level 3 email admins". We have an engineering group who design policy decisions and have them implemented, but not by any "level 3 email admins".

Secondly. The 1000 per day limit is correct but the 99 per hour is not correct.

I can assure you this information is accurate for the residential platform.