Comcast

Well, Frank was very kind to post his comment. But it doesn’t help.

…indicates the user name is invalid or there is trouble routing it to the Comcast.net server by the ISP or mail provider you use

he writes.

Well, there is a very well-known numismatic organisation in the USA and they use comcast. The CEO of the organisation has two comcast.net addresses. I needed to reply to an email which I had received from him – both emails bounced. This was from my bluewin.ch address. Then I tried using my gmail.com address – both emails bounced. I then tried my old web.de address – both emails bounced. I asked my brother in England to send the mails from his BT (British Telecom) address in England - both mails bounced. I asked an English numismatist living in Germany to send them from Germany – both mails bounced even though he tried sending them from two different addresses on two different mail servers, one of them being aol.com, the other t-online.de. The same applied when the emails were sent from the Professor of Numismatics and Archaeology at an Italian university. Both mails bounced. Finally I asked my friend in the US to send them – the emails got through.

So what Frank is again suggesting is that the DNS of all these mail servers, in Switzerland, England, Italy and Germany – are all set up wrong. The suspicious thing is that the email sent from Germany from an aol.com address was bounced, whereas the emails sent from the US from an aol.com address got through. So that puts paid to any DNS excuses and puts paid to any nonsensical “user name is invalid” rubbish.

• Fact is, emails from most European servers don’t get through.
• Fact is, comcast needs to stop blaming the error on European mail servers - where, by the way – email was invented (by CERN in Geneva, Switzerland).
• Fact is, no other mail server in the world acts in the same way that comcast.net does, by bouncing emails with such depressing regularity.
• Fact is, I am fed up with being humiliated by having to ask friends in the US to forward emails to comcast.net addresses.
• Fact is, US companies are certainly losing business and will continue to do so. (We finally gave up on ordering $12,000 worth of bicycle components from a firm in Arizona because emails to their comcast.net address kept bouncing).
• Fact is, that our (European) mail servers can find every other mail servers all over the world. But Frank says they can’t find the comcast.net server. So where is the error, hmmmm?
• Fact is, even a reply to Frank’s  @cable.comcast.net address bounced !!!

Comcast blocks emails from Europe

The USA is blessed (not!) with an internet provider called comcast.net. Apparently a lot of people who get TV through comcast are happy with them but more and more people – especially businesses who sell internationally or those wanting to sell their goods to Europe – are getting really really angry with comcast’s email service.
The problem is that comcast.net’s primitive anti-spamming filters check the headers of arriving emails for the sender’s IP. AND THOUSANDS OF HUNDREDS OF LIGITIMATE EUROPEAN IPS ARE BEING UNNECESSARILY BLOCKED BY COMCAST.NET’S ANTI-SPAM FILTER. Emails sent from most European countries to your comcast.net address will be bounced as undeliverable. This applies at the very least (and to my certain knowledge) to senders of emails from Germany, Switzerland, Holland, France, Italy, some British IPs, Sweden, Ireland and Austria. It applies to ALL comcast.net email addresses.

So say you are a European buyer on ebay and – after purchasing something – you attempt to contact the seller at his/her comcast.net address by email. Your email will be bounced back and the seller will not receive your email. This can lead to a lack of communication and possibly to poor or bad feedback.
Or you are a European seller on ebay and want to send an email to a buyer who is a comcast customer. Hard luck – the buyer will not get your email.
Or say you are in the US and have a business. A potential customer in Europe wants to order several thousand dollars-worth of goods from you. He copies the email address on your website to his email program, writes you an email asking for a quote – but within seconds, the email is bounced with the following message:

>xxxxxxxxx@comcast.net;
>
-> Failed
>Error-Code; 5.1.2 (bad destination system address)

Did you write the email address wrong ? NO! The address is correct and if you ask a friend in the US to send the email for you,  it will go through.

Comcast appears to have a personal grudge against European IPs. Even Europeans using yahoo, gmail, hotmail or other US freemail system will have their emails bounced, because the European IP is included in the header lines.

Comcast.net steadfastly refuses to revise its list of blocked IPs and ignores all requests from IP staff in Europe, preferring instead to apply its “why use a scalpel when you can use a sledgehammer?” policy.

And the really ludicrous part of it all is the lack of knowledge of their so-called customer service. I wrote to them explaining the problem that Europeans have. The first “solution” was that I …. wait for it…. clear my Internet browser cache (this is like telling a car driver whose engine has just blown up to empty the ashtray to solve the problem). Their next reply was that none of the 20+ addresses I gave them as examples, were valid. Utter nonsense! I asked my friend Don in the US to write to those addresses explaining the problem – and all the emails got through.

The last intelligent (not!) missive I received from comcast staff was that EVERY SINGLE MAIL SERVER IN EUROPE – plus yahoo, gmail, hotmail etc. WERE ALL SET UP WRONG and only comcast was set up right. Apart from shaking one’s head in disbelief at the sheer arrogance and ignorance of such a reply, it appears that nothing to be done.

So if you have an online business and use a comcast address and wonder why you don’t receive any enquiries from willing customers in Europe – or why you don’t receive replies to YOUR emails to Europe – you know why. Your insular provider apparently doesn’t think you have the right to receive emails from Europe and bounces them all as undeliverable.

Maybe it’s time for you to change your comcast.net email service to an email provider with a little more IT knowledge and customer-friendliness?