Let’s Send an Email Automatically in the Middle of a Workflow (Non-delivery response chapter)

Basic chapter: sending an email with a fixed mail body to a fixed address
Mail body chapter: changing the body of an email using embedded commands
Address embed chapter: changing the address of an email using embedded commands
HTML Email chapter: sending an HTML email
Non-delivery response chapter: troubleshooting when an email has not arrived

What to do if an email isn’t delivered

In the previous posts, we have created a workflow App that transmits an email using the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email). However, there could be cases where the email was not delivered as intended, despite you believing that you have created the App in accordance with the proper procedure. In this post I will introduce you to measures for handling such issues.

What to check on Questetra (the Sender-side)

To confirm whether the Event was successful

First of all, let’s confirm whether the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email) was successful. Open the detail page of the Process in question. When you check the Administrator Mode box in the Operation history section records of automatic Tasks will appear.

To enter Administrator Mode, you need to have App Administrator authorization. You can confirm who has the authorization in [Edit Authorization] < [App Detail]. The creator of the App has authorization by default.

When the administrator mode is turned on, you can check the status of automatic Steps

If the status of the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email) is “Abended” (Abnormally ended), the event has failed for some reason. In such a case an error notification is sent by e-mail to the App Administrator.

The format of an Error Notification email is as in the above figure. In this example, it says “Invalid email address” in the Error Detail, and the “To” address has no @ sign. This is an invalid string for an email address.

If the processing of the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email) has failed, check the error notification email and take the appropriate action.

To confirm the email address of the destination

The email address you entered as the destination could be incorrect. The error message “Email address is invalid” I mentioned above is only used when the input character string is not in the form of an email address. You might have possibly sent an email to a different place.

If you have entered the email address directly to the input field in the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email), check for typographical errors in the App details page. Also, if you have specified the email address by data embedding, confirm if the original data is correct.

Contact Questetra (the Sender-server administrator)

If you cannot solve the problem by confirming the above error or the address, or the email folder, etc. described later, please contact Questetra. (Inquiries can only be made from the email address registered as the System Administrator of Questetra BPM Suite.)

Inquiry Form

When making inquiries, please check the following details before and let us know them.

Message-ID of the email
To address
Approximate time of transmission

How to confirm the Message-ID of an email

I will explain how to confirm the Message-ID of an email on Questetra BPM Suite. Open the Process details page and check the Administrator Mode box. Then the [Process Log] button will appear.

Turn on Administrator Mode and open Process Log

In the Process Log page, you can confirm logs of each Step in the Process. Message-ID is written in the Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email) Step.

What to check on the Receiver-side

To confirm if the email was sent to the spam folder

The Throwing Message Intermediate Event (Email) has been completed successfully, and the destination does not seem wrong, yet you can’t find any emails that should have been sent to your inbox. In this case, the email could have been sent to the spam folder.

In the case of, for example, Gmail for the web, you can view the emails sorted into spam by opening “Spam” from the tray list on the left side of the page. Otherwise, you can look in “All Mail.”

Gmail messages are missing-Gmail Help

Investigate with Message-ID

If you still can’t find your email, try searching using Message-ID. Each email has a unique value referred to as a Message-ID. Gmail and others support searches using Message-ID, so if an email has been delivered, you can be sure to find it using this method.

Search emails based on Message-ID

For example, in the case of Gmail for Web, Message-ID search can be performed by using the search operator “rfc822msgid.”

In addition, by adding in:anywhere to a search query, it even searches in Trash/Spam folders.

Search operators you can use with Gmail-Gmail Help

For other email services, refer to the help page of the service.

Check restrictions on your email service

If you cannot confirm the receipt of the email, please check the restrictions of the email service you are using. Receiving may be rejected due to service-specific restrictions such as the storage capacity of emails reaching the limit or the size of emails exceeding the limit.

Check the log related to email reception

Depending on the email service, logs related to email communication may have been opened to users. You may be able to check the status of email reception (rejected, etc.) by examining such logs.

Example: Case with Google Workspace

If you use Gmail in Google Workspace, you can view the record of what happened when the limit was violated in “Email Log Search” in the Admin console. (Operation by the administrator of Google Workspace is required.)

Use Message-ID from [Report] > [Mail Log Search] in the side menu of the Admin console to check whether the target email has been processed.

Contact the Receiving-side server administrator

If you do not find an email even after searching by Message-ID there is a possibility that the email was undelivered. There may have been a problem with the Incoming email server. In that case, it is difficult to solve it by yourself, so you need to contact the email server administrator.

Contact destination

The administrator of the Incoming mail server differs depending on the service you are using. Refer to the help page of the respective service.

Inquiry Details

Message-ID of the email
To and From address
Approximate time of sending/receiving

Please tell the server administrator these three items for a smooth investigation.