Need clarification on '200 email' cap

[nate_s_]

Recently I was told by HostGator that there is a 200 email/hour cap. I assumed this meant that you can send a maximum of 200 outgoing emails in a single hour.

Earlier, I sent about 160 emails, then did some regular mailing (maybe 5-10 more messages). Suddenly, the mail server is telling me that I've exceeded the number of _connections_ I'm allowed per hour, and won't even allow me to check my email.

Is the "200" figure an outgoing email (SMTP) cap, or is it a TCP/IP connection cap? This is an important distinction, and I'm not particularly happy that I don't seem to be able to check my email without using webmail. Can someone who knows the answer clear this up?

[nate_s_]

gatorsupport3: yes there is a limit on it
gatorsupport3: i have checked with the admins
KEXXV: What is the limit?
gatorsupport3: 200
KEXXV: So let me get this straight.
KEXXV: I can only send messages OR check emails 200 times in an hour.
gatorsupport3: you can send 200 mails per hour
gatorsupport3: thats right
gatorsupport3: and can have only 200 connections per hour
KEXXV: You guys HAVE to post this on the website.
KEXXV: This is NOT something I can be discovering as I go along.

---

Per my last two lines, this kind of information is critical to know in advance. I cannot be discovering this stuff by trial and error and having my email knocked out for an hour when I accidentally stumble over some hidden configuration limit.

For what it's worth, this happened when I sent emails using Mail Bomber, which apparently opens a connection for each email sent. Why was I using Mail Bomber? Because Mailman will not handle a list bigger than 200 people, from everything I'm finding out.

From what I'm gathering, Hostgator has an effective hard limit of 200 emails per hour, 200 connections per hour (so you can't use an external mailer unless you're aware of this), and by extension, an effective mailing list cap of 200 people (because Mailman sends the messages out all at once rather than queueing them into something that Hostgator won't silently discard). Maddening. You guys have to post this somewhere so that other people don't trip over this stuff like I did.

[nate_s_]

While I'm still pissed, I might as well add one more thing.

It is totally stupid for a 200 email cap to be in place on a Diamond reseller account. We resell to at least 14 different domains at the moment, and possibly more in the future. Because the cap is basically covering the reseller's entire portfolio, this essentially means that each of my resold domains gets about 14 emails per hour, divided by however many email accounts on each domain. Since I know for a fact that some of our resold accounts have mailing lists and some have 20 or 30 email accounts, this pushes it down even more, effectively making it like 5 or 10 emails per hour per domain MAX.

What adds insult to injury is just that this information isn't posted anywhere. I didn't discover any of this until one of our clients was attempting to do some mission-critical mailings, and it's costing them thousands of dollars because some notifications were silently dropped. A pretty rough way to figure out what's going on, if you ask me.

[dotmil]

All I can say is:

[local]

OK so let me get this figured out, so for each domain you resell are they caped at 200 per domain or is the entire reseller account caped at 200. So if you have lets say 100 domains hosted from your reseller account and each have 3-4 email accounts on average they can only send roughly 2-3 emails an hour. ?

[nate_s_]

Local, that's what I'm trying to find out.

I'm fairly sure the entire reseller is capped, because the mailings went out on chcaa.org domain and my crucible.net (the master reseller) account started failing to deliver or check mail. This also matches with what I've been hearing from Ben at Hostgator. Like I said, it's really stupid and sort maddening.

[GatorBrent]

This isn't outgoing emails per hour it's connections per hour. Many resellers have 20+ pop connects set to automatically connect minutely.


We have limited it temp on some boxes to 30 connections a hour to flush these people into changing their settings.


There's no reason for email to be checked minutely when people sleep. Most of the server loads are from few 100 pop accounts checking every minute.


Please disable auto checking and just check your mail when needed. If you need auto checking set it to every 20 minutes or so.

[nate_s_]

Brent, there are two issues.

I understand limiting connections per hour on a per-ip basis to prevent exactly the type of overload you're describing. I'm not particularly complaining about that - my run-in with the connection limit was brought on by a bigger issue though.

The bigger issue is that there IS (according to Lyron, Ben, and some of the anonymous support people) a 200 email-per-hour cap. If I have a mailing list with 3,000 people [I do] and I try to send out a mailing, Mailman will try to send all 3,000 messages as quickly as possible. However, because of the Hostgator cap, 2,800 of those will be silently dropped without returning any sort of error and without being delivered. This means that, de facto, Hostgator doesn't really support mailing lists bigger than 200 members. This should be something written clearly somewhere.

In addition, the 200-per-hour outgoing cap seems to apply reseller-wide. That is, if one of my domains has a mailing list with 199 people, and they send out a mailing, and then in the same hour three or four people on other domains try to send out messages, those outgoing messages will be SILENTLY dropped. I've seemed to confirm this experimentally, using a couple of our domains, but I'd like to hear a Hostgator confirmation on this and see this posted somewhere for people to see. This, as I said before, becomes ridiculously low if you're reselling to more than a couple of domains.

I ran into the 200 connection limit while trying to MANUALLY send emails to some of those 3,000 people on my list. I sent out about 170, and then the remaining connections were eaten up because about 5 people share this office. Also, it's not just mail-checking that increments the connection coutner - if you happen to be replying to a number of messages and you send them immediately, each "sending" counts as a connection. This adds up quickly.

[GatorBrent]

For mailing list why are you using pop? You should use sendmail or mailman which has no limits this is the correcty way to send.

[nate_s_]

*tormented scream*

Brent, if you read back into this thread and the last thread I posted, you'll notice that we tried that first. The mailing failed, and Ben at Hostgator (and apparently Lyron as well) said that Mailman mailings count against the 200-per-hour cap. So, if we send a 3000-person mailing on Mailman, 2,800 of those messages are dropped, as well as anything else we try to send out during the hour following that mailing.

This is not just speculation; we sent out mailings in July, August, and earlier this month, and we've been hearing recently from dozens of people on those lists that they did not receive the mailings.

This is why clarification is needed on this issue. Either mailman can handle the mailings, or it can't. Can't be both. Read http://forums.hostgator.com/showthread.php?t=1290 for the full details.:-P

[tondelo]

Originally Posted by GatorBrent

This isn't outgoing emails per hour it's connections per hour. Many resellers have 20+ pop connects set to automatically connect minutely.


We have limited it temp on some boxes to 30 connections a hour to flush these people into changing their settings.


There's no reason for email to be checked minutely when people sleep. Most of the server loads are from few 100 pop accounts checking every minute.


Please disable auto checking and just check your mail when needed. If you need auto checking set it to every 20 minutes or so.

Brent,

I don't mean to derail nates topic but I think elaboration needs to be made with your mail policies and which boxes you mean by "some".

I've had complaints over the past two weeks between webmail authentication in Horde and people not able to access their pop mail and get an error of

'Your e-mail server rejected your login. Verify your user name and password in your account properties. Under Tools, click E-mail accounts. The server responded: -ERR You have exceeded the number of connections you are permitted to make per hour. Please wait a couple of minutes and try again.'

When and where did you plan on telling your clients this rule of a limited number of connections. I personally have pounding my head against a wall trying to resolve some of these issues with them only to find out now that you have a policy like this. I host sites with people other than hostgator and have NEVER run into a login limitation or an outgoing mail limitation like nate is experiencing.

The communication here just seems to be getting worse and I think it's obvious if you read some of the posts in these forums.

How many more policies are going to be created because of server problems and not relayed to customers? If you are having problems with server overload maybe it's time to get another server or two?

In the mean time, I do appreciate you telling us about the mail connection limit. At least now I can go back and have them double check their settings.

[ReGigi]

Originally Posted by nate_s_

This is why clarification is needed on this issue. Either mailman can handle the mailings, or it can't. Can't be both. Read http://forums.hostgator.com/showthread.php?t=1290 for the full details.:-P

You missed the part where the phone tech support called us idiots because "it's only logical" that a mailing list would drop messages after a certain point.

As I pointed out to him, the reason one USES a mailing list in the first place is so that it will regulate the amount of messages being sent - whether it takes one or forty-eight hours.

Yes, I am still peeved about Mr Obnoxious, though since you called and transferred it to me, I don't know which one that was. He managed to irk and insult TWO of your clients in one call.

(I referred the company Nate works for to Hostgator, and I am in the same general office space, so I hear first hand about the issues they are having. My usage needs are currently lesser than theirs, though I am worried about what will happen should we get larger.)

Gisela

[ReGigi]

Originally Posted by tondelo

When and where did you plan on telling your clients this rule of a limited number of connections. I personally have pounding my head against a wall trying to resolve some of these issues with them only to find out now that you have a policy like this. I host sites with people other than hostgator and have NEVER run into a login limitation or an outgoing mail limitation like nate is experiencing.

OOOOO YEA - That was the other thing buddy said on the phone: "all of this is posted on the site."

Uhm, no, it isn't.

I know, I went over it with a fine-tooth comb, and none of the limitations are posted ANYWHERE.

What an argumentative ass hat.

G.

[nate_s_]

Spoke to Brent on the phone today, and he assures us that Mailman is fixed and fully capable of sending out 3,000-member mailings and that it won't count against that 200-message cap.

This is all very well, but I still think the 200-sent-messages cap is too low for resellers, as I explained above.

Anyway, we have another mailing to send out in a couple of weeks, so we'll find out if Mailman is actually working again. Here goes...

[ttravlos]

Greetings - I was wondering if it has been confirmed that the cap has been lifted when using Mailman?

Thanks - tony

Originally Posted by nate_s_

Spoke to Brent on the phone today, and he assures us that Mailman is fixed and fully capable of sending out 3,000-member mailings and that it won't count against that 200-message cap.

This is all very well, but I still think the 200-sent-messages cap is too low for resellers, as I explained above.

Anyway, we have another mailing to send out in a couple of weeks, so we'll find out if Mailman is actually working again. Here goes...

[kraftbj]

I'd like some confirmation as well. I'm having problems with mailman not sending out certain messages via a listserve. I am not sure where the problem is and I haven't yet investigated to see if a 200/hour limit would have anything to do with it.

Frustrating.

[Serra]

Please read the TOS it is fairly clear:
http://www.hostgator.com/mailpolicy.shtml (from the TOS link)

[lakeRat]

I couldn't remember exactly where I read about the "200" limit, but I remembered it. I was reading into Hostgator and their policys before I joined up in February, so the mail policy Serra linked to has been there for while, nothing new.