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Troubleshooting: Email External Communications are not sending
Troubleshooting: Email External Communications are not sending
Updated over a week ago

What's happening:

Emails are not sending from Production Penelope, either to clients, Workers, or both.

Next steps:

First, determine which emails are not sending -- general emails, authentication emails, or both?

Then, it is important to determine if successful test emails can be sent and received from the External Communications setup page on the System Admin side of Penelope. It helps to test from both the Email and Authentication Email sections.

Notes:

  • Hybrid cloud/on-premise setups are not supported for use with Penelope.

  • Relays are not supported for use with Penelope.

  • Training B databases are not configured to send external communications and it is expected that external communications will not send.

If test emails are being sent and received successfully, but emails from elsewhere in Penelope are not being received...

  • Check the Recipient Configuration tab of the External Communications setup page and ensure that delivery is enabled and all settings are set to your agency's preferences, both for Workers and clients.

  • If applicable, ensure that Worker message settings are configured to Worker preference.

  • If applicable, ensure that client message settings are configured and consents have been selected for the relevant communications from Penelope.

If test emails are being sent and received but clients are not receiving Engage or ClientConnect emails as expected, please reach out to the Penelope Support Team.

If sending a test email does not produce an error but the test is not received by the test recipient...

  • Log in to the email account that is being used in the Email and/or Authentication email settings and check for any bounced email messages or other "undeliverable" messages relating to emails sent from Penelope. This would indicate that messages are being created successfully by Penelope, but changes may need to be made on your mail server. You can unblock the sending email account if needed.

  • Check the Sent folder of the email account that is being used in the Email and/or Authentication email settings. If emails from Penelope are in the Sent folder, then Penelope is creating the messages as expected.

  • Check the spam folder of the recipient of the test message and create a custom spam policy if needed. It is possible that other emails created by Penelope and sent by your agency's email address are being marked as spam for Workers, clients, or both.

  • Check for firewall or other similar settings on your agency's mail server. If you require your Penelope server IP address, please reach out to the Penelope Support Team.

If sending a test email produces a 2101 error...

(Exact error text may vary.)

A 2101 error is the result of Penelope being blocked from accessing a mail server due to factors external to Penelope or issues with the credentials that have been entered on the External Communications setup page.

  • Ensure that email is enabled in the section you are testing from (either the Email section or Authentication Email section) before attempting to send your test.

  • Update the password for the email account being used in your Penelope settings if it has changed.

  • Ensure that the email account being used can be logged into manually outside of Penelope without issue.

  • Ensure that two-step authentication is turned off for the email account.

  • Ensure that the email account being used for Penelope has been signed into and has a permanent password set -- if the email has a temporary password, your test will fail.

  • Check for firewall or other similar settings on your agency's mail server. If you require your Penelope server IP address, please reach out to the Penelope Support Team.

  • Ensure that POP/IMAP is enabled on your mail server or for your email account.

  • Check that the email address in question has a mailbox set up for it, and that mail can be sent and received from the address.

  • If Office 365 is being used, basic authentication is being depreciated and will be turned off for some users. At this time Penelope uses basic authentication and contacting Microsoft support to ensure that basic authentication remains on for your mail service is advised.

  • If Gmail is being used, you may need to allow access from "less secure" apps.

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