Verizon email w/ domain name, is third party website hosting possible

[HellzBelle]

Hello! I'm working on a website for a friend's business but am having a problem:

Her business uses Verizon DSL for email, with her own domain name. A hosting plan has already been purchased through another hosting company.
Currently, her domain name points to Verizon's servers, but if I point it to the web hosting company's servers, her company's email will be cut off. Is that correct?

Is it possible to keep her email accounts with Verizon using her domain name AND have her website hosted at another hosting service? If so, how would I go about setting this up?

[cameraman]

If I have example.com registered as my domain name, I can move it from one hosting company to another and cameraman @ example.com follows me around (I don't even have to make any changes in my email program). The email routes in and out of the host's mail server. You want to make sure the host provides pop3 and smtp to its hosting accounts.

As I understand it you could modify the MX records to keep the email flowing through Verizon but I've never tried anything like that. I can't really think of a reason you'd want to, though, unless maybe Verizon has some killer email features that the other host doesn't.

[HellzBelle]

Thanks for your response cameraman.
So, if I'm understanding correctly, there are basically two options:
1. use the webhost's email instead of keeping Verizon's email or
2. cancel the hosting account and use Verizon to host. Is that essentially what you mean?

You lost me on the MX records.
Thanks again.

[cameraman]

LOL yeah I get lost on the MX records too - my eyes glaze over and my brain doesn't absorb the information.
You can

1. send & receive email with it routing through the new host (unless it's one that doesn't provide that feature)
   
2. Modify the MX records to point to Verizon so that the web site is at the new host and emails are still routed through Verizon
   

I don't know anything about the process for accomplishing #2, but I know 'MX records' are the buzzwords to look for. Again, if #1 is possible, IMO that's the one that's highly preferable.

If her domain is example.com and her email is currently [e-mail] through Verizon, there's no reason that it wouldn't continue to be [e-mail] wherever the web site is hosted - in other words, just because the email gets routed through a different computer on the internet, she won't have to send out emails saying 'my new email address is' because it will continue to be 'attached' to her domain. It's possible that in her email program on her computer she might have to make some sort of minor configuration change, but I'm betting she won't even need to do that.

[jtara]

Her business uses Verizon DSL for email

I don't think you mean that. Maybe you mean that she sues Verizon DSL to *retrive* her email from the POP server. (Which is kinda irrelevant, as normally she could retrive her email from the POP server from *anywhere* using *any* kind of connection.)

Perhaps you mean that her MX records point to a Verizon SMTP server, as part of an email-hosting service provided along with her DSL package.

I think you need to clarify just what she has.

Currently, her domain name points to Verizon's servers

This kinda confirms what I'm guessing above.

but if I point it to the web hosting company's servers, her company's email will be cut off. Is that correct?

Not sure what you mean by "it". Again, you need to be more precise. I am assuming by "it" you mean the DNS A records for example.com and/or www.example.com?

If so, this has (almost - see below) nothing to do with email.

The DNS MX records control where email goes. This is independant of any A records. They don't have to be the same.

Now, one little hitch - the server named in the A record for a domain is "supposed" to also accept email directly. But this is widely misconfigured, and really not necessary as a practical matter. All mail servers use the MX records to determine where to deliver mail. The direct-delivery option might be used in some cases if all of your MX servers are down. (But most likely the sending server would just queue the mail until one of the MX servers IS available.) In that case, the mail would just go undelivered, unless you have an SMTP server set up on the A-record address.