E-Mail Problems – As we continue to evolve into the world of email becoming a part of our daily lives, sometimes small issues arise that annoy users. Previously we talked about replied messages and lost connections, which can both make things worse and provide solutions.
However there are a few more issues that can affect email users causing frustration and we will address them here, and once again provide reasonable solutions to overcome them.
Sending emails to invalid or mistyped email addresses often results in delivery failures. This can happen when recipients provide incorrect email addresses or if there are typos or formatting errors in the email address.
Some possible causes include internet connectivity issues, emails being accidentally deleted or sent to the trash folder, problems with external email clients, or technical issues with the device or browser you are using to access your email.
Common E-mail Problems and Solutions
One of the biggest challenges of email communication is conveying the right tone and voice. Unlike phone or chat, email does not have the benefit of vocal cues, facial expressions, or body language.
You Can’t Send Email
Even if there are no connection problems, you may try sending an email, only to find that it is still in your outbox.
Solution Can’t Send Email
Usually this is a software problem, the result of an unseen corruption or damage to one or more email messages. To resolve this issue, first copy all unsent messages as text. Then save it on your computer hard disk or backup storage media.
Once all messages are saved, highlight all messages in your outbox and click “delete” or “delete”. When emptying your outbox, start from the beginning. Just copy the unsent message from the text file, forward it to a new email message and resend it.
Email Has No Attachments or Attachments Cannot Be Opened
A very useful email feature is the ability to send and receive attachments. Sending documents, photos, or other similar information can save time and money compared to US Mail or other express delivery services.
At the same time, attachment can be very confusing. A common frustration is receiving an email message that refers to an attachment, but then finding nothing there.
Solution Email Has No Attachments
Often the best solution is to ask the sender to try again, as it is not unusual for the author to refer to an attachment, but then forget to attach it. Even if this isn’t the case, your request may require the sender to rethink the attachment format before sending it again.
If the problem persists, consider asking the sender to paste the content in the email message and try again. This may interfere with formatting, but can be an effective way to avoid attachment problems.
If you see a message that the attachment has been deleted, perhaps your anti-virus software has detected a virus, and it is better for you not to use the virus. But if you find that all attachments are deleted indiscriminately, check your email properties.
If the box is checked that blocks all attachments, uncheck it so you can receive attachments. If you then receive a message from someone you don’t know, or if the message or attachment seems suspicious, delete the message without opening the attachment.
A related problem is seeing that an attachment has been sent, but finding that you can’t open it. The causes (and solutions) vary. In some cases, the problem is that the software the sender is using does not match the recipient’s software.
As with any missing attachment, a simple fix is to ask the sender to copy and paste the contents of the attachment in a follow-up email message. Even if formatting is compromised, you can still get the gist of the information. You can also use your own copy and paste process to reformat content, if that’s important.
Another strategy is to save the document to your hard drive, then open the software program that was originally used to create it.
Once this program is used, your computer may be able to recognize the attachment, and open it. If you do not have the appropriate software loaded on your computer, you may be able to download it from the Internet; just follow the on-screen instructions to continue.
You Have Too Much Incoming Mail or Can’t Download What You Have
If you receive a large number of emails, you may be susceptible to some difficulties.
Solution Much Incoming Mail or Can’t Download
Many Internet service providers limit the amount of storage provided to each user (although some service providers have recently increased storage limits). If a pre-set limit is reached (perhaps because you haven’t downloaded an email for too long, or have been inundated by SPAM or a flood of messages caused by a virus), additional messages will be returned to the sender.
Of course the direct approach is to download your email and then throw it away, but a smarter move may be to access your email account via Web email. That way you can see a list of all messages and quickly delete any messages that don’t seem interesting.
The end result is the same, but this step can save a lot of download time if you use a dial up modem. It also adds extra protection against viruses even if you have a broadband connection. Because you delete messages from your ISP’s servers before they have a chance to infect your computer, this is like killing mosquitoes before they bite you – not after.
If you don’t have a Web email account, it’s easy to get one. Just visit a provider like Yahoo (www.yahoo.com) or Lycos (www.lycos.com) and sign up. You can also use sites like mail2web (www.mail2web.com) or webmail4free.com without even registering.
Visit the site and enter your email address and password. You’ll see a list of all your incoming emails, which you can read and save for download, or delete, as you choose.
Similar challenges may be caused by unusually large message sizes. Again, this problem is more common with dial-up modems, where hefty messages may take a very long time to download. In the worst case, you may not be able to receive another message, because the connection with the server where your message is stored is lost when the time limit has been reached.
The use of Web email can also help here. Just visit a third-party site, peruse the list of messages in your inbox, and choose the largest (most Web email programs automatically list the size of each message). If the message seems interesting, open it and read it, then delete it.
Or if it’s clearly spam or something you’re not interested in, you can delete the message without bothering to read it. Once you delete the offending message, your other incoming emails will no longer be blocked.
If you don’t have Web email, an option is to contact your Internet Service Provider and ask for help. Once the customer service representative removes the offending message from the ISP’s servers, you can then download all remaining messages.
Also keep in mind that storing too many emails can be an organizational problem, if not a technical one. Take the time to delete emails that you don’t need to keep for future reference.
Letting too many messages pile up wastes storage space and makes it difficult to find important messages when you need to refer to them. For messages that need to be saved, create a series of folders so they’re easy to find and your inbox doesn’t get too full.
