AOL blocking emails from websites with non-dedicated IP addresses

emails from forms on website no longer working

[Lorel]

How come there isn't a forum for AOL discussions?

I have a client who informed me that he wasn't getting emails from his website forms. He has email like [e-mail] that redirects to his personal aol email and they weren't getting through all of a sudden--had been working since the site went online last year.

I called the hosting company and they informed me that AOL has started blocking all emails from websites that don't have a dedicated IP address.

Sounds like AOL is trying to exclude the Internet.

[jatar_k]

I think they are either misinformed or don't quite understand something

AOL is strict but not impossible and it has nothing to do with

"blocking all emails from websites that don't have a dedicated IP address"

the messages themselves should be evaluated to make sure they rank 0 on the old spamometer try this list for common spam status flags [spamassassin.apache.org...]

you may need to relay as opposed to sending messages directly

the mail servers you send through will need this [spf.pobox.com...]

you will also need to make sure reverse lookups are right for that mail server

You will also need to look at headers for the actual email the script is creating

I think the host has over simplified the issue

[jimbeetle]

Ahh, found it again. Post was locked when I first replied. Actually good, now that jatar_k jumped in I can keep it a bit shorter.

Check out the Troubleshooting AOL E-mail Delivery [postmaster.aol.com] page. It has a number of tools and tests that can help you track down the problem.

I started having problems getting mail to AOL users about two weeks ago. It took me some time to work through all of the tests and such but I tracked it down to not having reverse DNS lookup enabled; all was fine once my host pushed the button.

Your hosts comment about the non-dedicated IPs sounds like AOL's policy of not accepting connections from dynamic or residential IPs, not non-dedicated. If it's a reverse DNS issue everything is fine as long as the IP resolves to something.

Speeling edit.

[griggsse]

I work for a large public library that sends email notices to patrons when they have books ready for pick-up. We send about 2000 every day.

Since February, all AOL email addresses have bounced back our messages. Our reverse DNS lookup is enabled, and AOL has claimed to have "whitelisted" us.

Has anyone had a similar problem?

I would appreciate any assistance. The bounced emails have been very taxing to our poor server.

[ac112]

griggsse, we're experiencing a very similar problem. All (and only) AOL email sent to out customers bounce. We have not been able to identify a fix for this quite yet.

[hannamyluv]

I had a customer on one of my sites tell me she was dropping AOL b/c her emails had stopped getting through to her box. They may be well intentioned with this new, stricter filter, but they may be biting themselves if they have made it so strict that people can't get the emails they want.

[lasko]

Actually these last 2 weeks we've started having issues again with AOL

The server has been blacklisted again with AOL and after a few weeks will be whitelisted.

Why can't AOL and other ISP provide an overide for users to allow certain addresses?

Email is so un-reliable and the technology behind email is so out of date.

Big advances has been made in VOIP and other technologies but the simple email has not changed and ISP's simple solution is to block everything that looks like spam.

I am no email/mail server wizard but surely email could be better! and ISP's could do better!

[griggsse]

We also believe that AOL whitelists us, and then blacklists us again the next day as we send out more emails.
You would think they'd eventually get sick of all the phone calls from webmasters. It must give them a sinister sense of power.

[john_k]

Make sure you have an SPF record set up for the senders domain. With the situation you described, in particular, make sure that the end of the SPF string is "?all"

To check your SPF string for problems, you can use the SPF test at dnsstuff.com
[dnsstuff.com...]

[mcavic]

AOL has started blocking all emails from websites that don't have a dedicated IP address

If that is in fact the issue, AOL is right to do that. There's no real excuse for sending mail from a non-dedicated IP address.

All legitimate mail should be sent through your ISP's or hosting company's mail server.

[griggsse]

They're blocking much more than that. We have a dedicated IP address, and we're whitelisted. Still, nothing goes through.

[john_k]

If you don't have an SPF record, they will also block you.