AOL recently began rejecting emails sent from my production server.
Customers make product requests through my website and can "cc" themselves if they so wish. I check spam (for example, do not send if the request contains prohibited phrases, URLs, etc.). However, recently, if the requestor is an AOL client, the message bounces:
<*removed!*@aol.com>: host mailin-04.mx.aol.com[64.12.88.132] said: 521 5.2.1 :
AOL will not accept delivery of this message. (in reply to end of DATA
command)
The email protocol is not in my area of expertise! I just use the standard PHP mail () function and this has been working for many years.
I looked at the AOL Postmaster support pages and contacted AOL (which, obviously, was my first port of call, but they haven't answered yet), and I really don't understand the problem (which is 50% of finding the solution!).
http://postmaster-blog.aol.com/2014/04/22/aol-mail-updates-dmarc-policy-to-reject/
... AOL seems to say "we don’t like the way you send emails, sorry for the inconvenience you ..."
If anyone has any experience or a specific understanding of how to get AOL to accept emails, I would like to hear from you. I assume that this may be due to the way my emails are formed: this has not changed over the years and (earlier), I had no reason to look at the code:
Here is an edited version of how I send emails ...
$recipient = "\"$supplier[supplierName]\" <$supplier[supplierEmail]>";
$subject = "$supplier[supplierName] enquiry";
$headers = "MIME-Version: 1.0".PHP_EOL ;
$headers .= "Content-type: text/html; charset=utf-8".PHP_EOL;
$headers .= "Reply-To: \"$cleanArrayEmail[realname]\" <$cleanArrayEmail[email]>".PHP_EOL;
$headers .= "From: \"Admin\" <ADMIN_EMAIL>".PHP_EOL;
if ($_POST['cc']){$headers .= "cc: \"$cleanArrayEmail[realname]\" <$cleanArrayEmail[email]>".PHP_EOL;}
mail ($recipient, $subject, $msg, $headers, '-f'. ADMIN_EMAIL );
Thanks a lot Steve