Email Alerts - Hotmail email account keeps getting locked

[IAmATeaf]

Been using a hotmail account for email alerts from BI for quite some time, probably well over a year but recently the account keeps getting blocked and I have to unblock it every day. The block is citing using the account against their T&Cs!

I think their engine believes that the account is being used to send out spam emails as the sender and receiver are the same but am not too sure. I had tried using a Gmail account but although BI would send the email alert when checking the account on my phone I'd not see the email in the InBox which is why I moved over to using a Hotmail account.

Anybody have similar to can recommend a free email service that I could possibly try? Having to unblock the account everyday is a right royal pain

 

[jeremyx]

The Gmail problem is probably the same thing that's getting the Hotmail account locked: sending from an account to itself. Gmail tends to file a message sent through its own SMTP to the same address under Sent / All Mail rather than the Inbox, so it looks like it never arrived. Microsoft has also become very strict about automated sending from free Outlook.com accounts, so I wouldn't count on that one settling down.

What usually works better is a dedicated sender account used only by BI, for example a new Gmail with 2-step verification turned on and an app password in BI's email settings (smtp.gmail.com, port 587, TLS), sending to your normal address. The alerts then land in your Inbox like any other mail, and if a provider ever gets twitchy it's only the throwaway account that gets locked.

On your phone, add the sender address to your contacts or make a filter so the alerts never end up in spam.

 

[IAmATeaf]

I do have a dedicated hotmail account that I have authorised BI via an app password, so when it works it works. It's hotmail deciding that there is activity which triggers something that then blocks the account. Was never an issue until a few weeks ago.

Yep I saw the same thing using a gmail account, alerts seemed to vanish, was fine on a laptop but on a phone it wasn't convenient to go hunting for the alert.