What to do if your emails get listed¶
If you think your emails are listed, you can confirm this by checking on an IP reputation service checker. One example with a range of lists is MultiRBL. Another (less comprehensive) IP reputation check can be found at MXtoolbox. It’s quite common to be shown as being listed, for example rbldns.ru has most IPs listed by default. Some lists may also return “Failed” - that’s common and may simply mean the request timed out, rather than you being on the listed.
What to do if you find yourself on a list¶
The first step is to try and find why you’ve been listed. Many lists allow you to look up the reason they’ve added you to their lists, which can be a good first step in your investigation. You can also check your mail logs to look for spam or suspicious activity. Please see our guidance on checking logs for Postfix and Exim mail servers. Services like Mail-tester can also help you find and resolve issues.
Once you’ve found the issue and fixed it, you can start getting delisted. As a hosting provider UKFast is not able to get you removed from lists, however most lists provide an easy delisting process you can use. In most cases you should follow the steps provided on the provider’s website. A few will expire automatically once the cause is resolved. Some lists will ask you to pay money to “expedite” the process of removal - UKFast cannot advise whether this is the best course of action for your individual circumstances. That said, if you feel you have resolved whatever issue caused you to be listed in the first place, it may be worthwhile if you send to mail servers which use those lists, since some listings will take up to a month to expire.
Please note that most lists use DNS and have a TTL (Time To Live). This is the number of seconds that resolvers will cache the result of the list lookup. Therefore if a list has a very high TTL, it may mean that some mail servers will continue to reject mail for a while even after you are removed from the list.
Microsoft, Google and Yahoo¶
These providers maintain their own private lists, and you cannot check if you are on these lists. However, if you have delivery issues to domains like Hotmail, Outlook, Gmail or Yahoo, there’s a good chance you may be on one of these private lists. The best way to check is to look in your mail logs for 550 response codes and error messages from these providers. Again, please see our guides on checking logs for Postfix and Exim mail servers.
Microsoft/Hotmail/Office365¶
Microsoft mail servers are a little different to other providers. Their lists are not public so you cannot check if you are listed. You must always get an IP address (or range) permitted to send if you want the mail to end up in the correct mailbox. If you have problems with your mail ending up in spam, or not appearing at all, this is likely the reason.
If you have this issue, read our guide in the basics of mail section, which should help you address this.
Google / Gmail¶
Google provides some useful guidance on mail which is also worth reading.