Another gmail rejection issue

[#1]

Hi, I'm another person getting the gmail rejection problems. I have tried following Townman's excellent and concise instructions from another thread. I believe I am following them all but I'm still getting the gmail bounce problem with mutliple gmail addresses. (I note that I initially tacked this onto a thread marked as solved, I'm reposting here and have asked moderators to remove my previous message).

In my circumstance, I am trying to send from 'myname'@'account'.plus.com, from the Thunderbird client. In the outgoing SMTP settings I have authentication with password enabled, using relay.plus.net, Port 587 and STARTTLS conenction security picked. I also get the rejection if I try to send from webmail.

Can you see anything else that I would need to configure in order to mitgate the problem?

My bounce emails I'm recieving are as such:

      This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.      

Delivery to the following recipients failed permanently:

   * [GMAIL ACCT]

Reason: A message that you sent to the following recipient could not be delivered due to a permanent error. ** The remote server ?? responded with: ** [GMAIL ACCT] ??:?? This message was created automatically by mail delivery software on the server .

Reporting-MTA: dns; avasout-ptp-004 [IP Address]
Received-From-MTA: dns; [IP Address] [IP Address]
Arrival-Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2023 20:54:34 +0100


Final-recipient: rfc822; [GMAIL ACCT]
Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 550-5.7.26 This mail is unauthenticated, which poses a security risk to the

[#2]

Searching that error code, delivers these useful hits...

What does error 550 5.7.26 refer to? Our mail is rejected with this error for the last week? - Gmail...

Gmail SMTP errors and codes - Google Workspace Admin Help

550, "5.7.26", "This message does not have authentication information or fails to pass authentication checks (SPF or DKIM). To best protect our users from spam, the message has been blocked. Please visit Prevent mail to Gmail users from being blocked or sent to spam for more information."

OK so @account.plus.com does not have SPF, but it does have DKIM, if the SMTP connection is authenticated and so should be accepted under Gmail's A or B rule (it is not a AND rule).  HOWEVER the webmail connection is ALWAYS authenticated.

@bobpullen - any thoughts please?

[#3]

@GKofGTM 

As an aside - GTM - not by any chance a plant equipment hire company in North Cheshire?

[#4]

ahaha no - GTM is the initials of an old gaming forum I frequented over a decade ago and GK is the initials of my account name there.

[#5]

Adding my name to the list of users facing this issue. Tried forwarding some emails to my gmail account (via mail on my iphone). Just get the Mail delivery failes messages. Amongst other things I use gmail as a better long term archive for key emails as I have a 30d deletion rule for plusnet in order to keep hitting the mailbox size limit.

Perhaps it is time to move to a better email client for my plusnet account. In the mean time I'm sending the emails I need to keep (e.g. booking for services, holidays etc.) to gmail via my work email account.

[#6]

I'm getting exactly the same as the OP

Friend of mine has swapped to Gmail and now all messages I send to him get an immediate bounce.

Cannot send to my own Gmail address either.

Emails from my Yahoo and Freeola addresses, send fine, same email client, Thunderbird

[#7]

I have been getting the same problems sending emails from my Plusnet domain to Gmail. After some lengthy searching, reading, head scratching and various expletives I contacted Plusnet CS.

It seems that Plusnet is dumping on it's loyal customers, member since 2005. Here is the response from Plusnet CS to my call: -

Thank you for your time on the phone today. 

You complained of your mails sent to Gmail accounts being rejected with a request for an SPF record. Please note that this is an issue due to changes made at gmail's side, and it is unfortunately out of our hands. As a broadband supplier, we only have a basic domain platform and have over the past few years been moving away from this as a company.

This means our platform does not support SPF records (the requirement for the gmail upgrade) and we cannot add this feature onto the platform.  

Whilst we do not offer SPF records, we do offer MX records and there is a work-around which utilises these that has fixed the issue for some customers.

Details of this can be found on our community forums here: Fixed: Re: Replies to Gmail accounts being rejected - Plusnet Community Please also note, the you will need to log into the member centre and update these records.

Below are some useful links to assist with these changes 

Domain management | Help | Plusnet

Managing DNS records | Help | Plusnet 

Once you have made these changes, they can take up to 24 hours to take effect. 

As mentioned on the call also, Plusnet will soon be discontinuing domain support services. To this end, you will have to get a domain supplier of your choice, ask them for an IPS (Internet Provider Security) Tag which you will then supply to us and we can effect the domain transfer to your new chosen provider. 

We apologize for the inconvenience these changes may cause you.

As you can I imagine I utterly disgusted with the attitude of Plusnet. After 18 years of being a customer and generally having had a reliable service I am left completely flabbergasted. We do not have a huge budget for BB/email/website services Plusnet have been our one place for all of these along with our phones, landline and mobile. It turns out the new contract they agreed with me in September 2022 was totally pointless.

Oh, and they're also removing they're mobile phone provision. Words fail me!

At the moment I am wondering where I can find an alternative supplier for all my Plusnet facilities without having to pay several different vendors.

[#8]

Hold one here - something is amiss.

• Native email addresses @account.plus.com have DKIM - which is enough for Gmail
• Plusnet HOSTED domain names have the means to configure SPF - which should be enough for Gmail
• Domain names hosted elsewhere, for users bouncing their email through Plusnet's mail services (rather than using the domains own email services) might be able to configure a SPF record on their hosting service's control panel to use Plusnet's SMTP servers

Mitigating email delivery failures

Many users are reporting challenging issues in sending emails to some of the big email players. Some of those providers (notably Gmail, but only in respect of their free email accounts) have mandated the SPF & DKIM non-mandatory RFCs on other email providers, such as Plusnet. This can bring about significant difficulty when attempting to send emails using the various Plusnet and vISP legacy email services.

If a user is sending email using a from address of you@youraccount.plus.com then DKIM signing will be applied to the email automatically (and pass Gmail's imposed restrictions) if the SMTP server is configured to require authentication. Somewhat unhelpfully, Plusnet's email setup guide suggests that such authentication is NOT required if connecting over a Plusnet connection. Whilst technically true, operational complications can occur and it is much tidier to just enable authentication with the "use the same account settings as the incoming server" option.

If you send from your own domain name, then DKIM signing is not available and you will need to configure SPF instead. How to do this depends on where your domain is hosted - by Plusnet or by third party.

For Plusnet hosted domains, SPF configuration is facilitated by the addition of a TXT record in the domain's DNS settings. Plusnet's DNS configuration tool for hosted domains does not permit the creation of TXT records. However, there is an unsupported "facilitation" which will create an SPF record for a hosted domain.

On the basis that your account ALREADY has a hosted domain, go to Manage Account -> Manage Your Domains -> Configure domain name ... and create an "Additional DNS records (Advanced)" as follows...

To configure SPF on a domain name hosted elsewhere, you must use your domain name provider's DNS configuration tools to set up the following SPF record:

v=spf1 a mx include:_spf-internal.plus.net include:_spf-internal2.plus.net ~all

If your email service is provided by one of the legacy vISP brands acquired over the years by Plusnet, similar options are not available to you.

The super users have been monitoring and discussing this issue and running tests.  I have just sent emails (via webmail) using identities for my hosted domain and the native email address.  Both arrived at Gmail with no issue.  The hosted domain showed SPF passed and the native domain showed DKIM pass.

Therefore there is a possibility that the issue is neither of these.

From the above tests, it was interesting to note, that even when sending via webmail MY IP address is disclosed in the headers.  It therefore would be appropriate to consider the possibility that there could be an issue with the sending IP address.

Does anyone reporting these issues have a static IP address?

If you do not, please might you

• Identify and record your current IP address (Google whatsmyipaddress)
• Switch off your router for at least 90 minutes
• Turn it back on
• Identify and record the (hopefully) new IP address (Google whatsmyipaddress)
• Attempt to send an email again

The fact that this works for many, but not for some, points to issues different to just SPF & DKIM.

Users should not rule out the possibility that the Gmail bounces are actually due to the CONTENT of your email.  Bounce messages should be clear, they are often not so.  It helps to share the actual message rather than "Gmail is bouncing my emails too...".  There are various reasons for rejecting inbound email and it does not help to think they are one and the same.

The easiest way to profile that consideration is to send an empty email to a Gmail address and see if it bounces.  Just put "test from email@address" in to the subject and "Hello test from me" in the body and hit send.

If Gmail bounces the email and it comes from...

• You@youraccount.plus.com - then that is a DKIM failure
• You@yourdomain.co.uk - then that is a SPF failure

Remember the easiest way to do this is to use webmail for the testing.

[#9]

deleted , @Townman  beat me to it and posted more or less what I said...

[#10]

If I am incorrect in my comments then I apologise, but everything that Plusnet is telling me is in the contained notes from the ticket.

Based on @Townman post can't Plusnet just give me simple instructions on how to resolve my issue instead of continually saying "nowt to do with us"! I'm not totally technically inept but sometimes I do need a clear step by step guide.

Our osbornedance.co.uk domain supplied & hosted by Plusnet and as far as I know linked from the start to our plus.com. We are on a static IP address.

Can it be sorted so that our services can continue without any transfer from Plusnet?  If so, What do I need to do?

I've just tried to add an MX record with 

v=spf1 a mx include:_spf-internal.plus.net include:_spf-internal2.plus.net ~all

in the right field which returned the following message:-

>>>>>>>> 

Sorry, there was a problem

Error: Only the characters . - a-z 0-9 are allowed in the right field

>>>>>>>>

Have missed something?

[#11]

@Lordwotsit so its a hosted domain that's giving the problem and it can be fixed.

You cannot add an SPF record directly using the domain control panel BUT if you follow @Townman s advice above https://community.plus.net/t5/Email/Another-gmail-rejection-issue/m-p/1926230#M43655 and add the dummy MX record 'please-add-spf-records' , then within a few hours , you should find your domain has an SPF record and the problem sending to gmail should be resolved.

[#12]

@MisterW  Yep, tried adding that and got the error message back saying invalid characters in right field!

[#13]

@Lordwotsit sorry to be blunt , but in that case you entered it wrong!

Ok, maybe I confused things with using quotes in my previous reply to highlight the text.

To be clear, you create an MX record , priority 999999 with the text please-add-spf-records in the right field. NB no quotes. The required record was designed to work within the character restrictions.

Note you do NOT enter the SPF record text. The dummy MX record is a trigger for a script which runs in the background ( about every 6 hrs ) and creates the real SPF record directly on the DNS servers.

[#14]

I tried adding the dummy MX record for one of my hosted domains a few hours ago.

I have just successfully sent an email to my own gmail address.

I have sent one to my friend also. No reply yet, but no immediate bounce/error either.

So fingers crossed.

Thankyou @Townman 

Still going to have to look for an alternative for my couple of domains and email though as I feel it is inevitable that one day PN will drop them, and I'd rather not do it in a rush. Once I have found a successful alternative, then it will be bye bye PN for me.

[#15]

@geehawk with more than one domain , I'd suggest looking at https://www.mythic-beasts.com/hosting . They're unusual in that you can host multiple domains on one account, with unlimited mailboxes. Yes, the basic email only hosting can be a bit restrictive in terms of storage space but prices are reasonable and support is excellent.