"Send a Message" emails not received by members with byu.net email addresses

Somebody in my ward informed me that they were not getting emails that ward leaders were sending to all ward members. I (the ward clerk) tested a few things, like (1) removing their email and reentering it, (2) emailing them from outside the "send a message" feature (they received it), and (3) emailing only them from inside the "send a message" feature (they did not receive it).

They have a byu.net domain email address. Out of curiosity, I changed my wife's email to her byu.net address and tried sending her a message through the "send a message" feature. She did not receive it, though she did receive another test email I sent outside the "send a message" feature. She even tried changing the forwarding protocol on her byu.net account, and it still did not receive emails sent through the "send a message" feature. I then searched for other members of the ward with byu.net email addresses, and found that they were also not receiving the emails sent through the "send a message" feature. They receive other church emails (family search, general church announcements, etc.) but not our ward emails.

This seems like a fairly significant problem, unless I'm not diagnosing it correctly. Have others noticed this problem? Is church headquarters aware of this problem?

Do the members have a byu.edu email account, or is it just a forwarding service?

A number of people have reported that byu forwarding is not working when forwarded to gmail. This may be a limitation of the forwarding services to continue to function as email systems are tightened up to block spam.

They do not have byu.edu accounts, just the byu.net domain that alumni get. Hence they are all forwarding to something else (gmail in most cases).

Two other things: (1) Those getting emails forwarded to gmail are still getting other emails, just not the ones sent through “send a message” and (2) my wife was using a different .net domain forwarded to gmail that worked (received “send a message” emails), but the byu.net version did not work. Hence, if the problem is gmail being strict, it is only being strict for messages sent through “send a message” to a byu.net address.

Perhaps the issue lies with byu's forwarding system, or how it handles the forwarding. I'd suggest contacting them. As far as I know, the forum has no special access to that group.

A post in another thread (sorry, I searched but did not find it) suggests that the BYU system will not forward the emails because of the way the Church sends them. Something in the Church email headers triggers the BYU system to think they are suspect/spam/etc. and so they are not forwarded.

One fix would be for the BYU system to let them through, but that would be irresponsible in today's world. The other fix would be for the Church to figure out how to prepare their emails so that they will be forwarded.

The BYU system block is not the only one. You will find that others in your ward on other domains are not receiving the emails, either, but I hesitate to name names here because I would get it wrong based on my faulty memory. You would, however, recognize the domains.

Whether the Church is aware or not, I do not know. I know it has been pointed out before. But it takes getting the message to the right person, and it then takes permissions and resources to make any changes necessary to the email system.

I would simply let my leaders know that I do not receive their messages sent through the Church system, that it is a known issue, and then let the leaders tangle with headquarters as attempts are made to figure out the best way to communicate with members.

BYU IT said it was a problem with the church software, and the church IT said it was a problem with BYU's forwarding scheme. Hence, it may take awhile to fix, so I'm suggesting that the members of my ward having this problem use a different email address in our ward directory.

Thank you all for commenting.

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one with this problem. I have also stopped receiving email from missionary.org at my byu.net address.
What's truly odd is that I do get the periodic email messages from Communication@email.churchofjesuschrist.org and also email from FamilySearch.

doylea wrote:I have also stopped receiving email from missionary.org at my byu.net address.

I figured out that the missionary.org messages were stuck in the spam filter (filter.byu.edu), but the "Send a Message" email doesn't even get there.

This is still a problem. Emails from ward leaders are filtered to spam. I use Gmail with my byu.net address. Is there a solution other than using a different email? It started for me with the change to churchofjesuschrist sender.