Need help?

Our experts have had an average response time of 13.14 minutes in February 2024 to fix urgent issues.

We will keep your servers stable, secure, and fast at all times for one fixed price.

“The server rejected one or more recipient addresses”- Here’s how to fix

by | Nov 26, 2018

Help please! When I send an email inside my domain it works fine… but once I send an email outside of the domain, I get the error: “The server rejected one or more recipient addresses. The server response was: 550 5.7.1 Unable to relay.”

That was a recent request that we received at our Outsourced Technical Support services helpdesk for Web Hosting providers.

Mail servers typically allows all genuine mails. But, if the sender email address appears as fraud, they simply reject mails.

Today, we’ll see what causes this mail error and how our Support Engineers fix it.

 

What causes “The server rejected one or more recipient addresses” error?

From our experience in managing servers, we usually see this error in Windows based mail servers like Exchange server, MailEnable etc.

The major reasons for this error include:

 

1. Wrong sender domain

At times, website owners configure the forms that send mails with wrong sender domains. This can be some simple typo errors in the sender domain.

As a result, mail server fails to identify it as a trusted sender and rejects the mail.

 

2. Sender domain on a different server

Similarly, we see this error when the sender domain has a different IP address pointing to another server.

For security reasons, server administrators configure mail servers to accept mails from its own domains only. Also, it rejects mail from a website that is not pointing to your server. Or, in other words, server is set up as a closed relay.

And in such cases, users will experience problems only when sending mails outside the server.

 

How to fix “The server rejected one or more recipient addresses” error?

Now that we know the reason for the error, let’s see how to fix it.

Basically, the fix is to make mail server understand that sender is a trusted one. For this, we can easily do 2 things.

1. Change sender domain

Here, we need to change the sender domain in the web form to a valid website on the server. Thus mail server identifies it as trusted and accepts the mail.

 

2. Allow relay for selected IP address

Alternately, we can add the IP address of the domain as a trusted sender in mail server configuration. The steps differs depending on the exact mail server.

i) In MailEnable

In MailEnable, we can add the IP 127.0.0.1 in the “Allow relay for privileged IP list” from MailEnable Console.  But, this comes with a security risk that any domain hosted on the server can send mails to external domains.

So, our Support Engineers recommends adding the IP of the dedicated server to the privileged IP list. Additionally, we lock down the firewall on the server, so that only authorized IPs can connect to the SMTP port 25.

In a Plesk Onyx server, this privileged IP addresses can be added via Tools & Settings >> Server-Wide Mail Settings option.

recipient_rejected

 

ii) In Exchange server

Similarly, in Exchange server, our Support Engineers allow relaying only for specific IP addresses. That way, the server will not function as an open relay for all. Also, we lock down the firewall for the Exchange server, so that only authorized IPs can connect to the SMTP port in the first place.

We modify the list of relay IP addreses and mails flow out successfully.

 

Conclusion

For security reasons, Mail servers allows traffic only from trusted senders. And, if it suspects a fraud activity, it reject mails with error. Today, we’ve seen the causes for email error “The server rejected one or more recipient addresses” and how our Support Engineers fix them.

PREVENT YOUR SERVER FROM CRASHING!

Never again lose customers to poor server speed! Let us help you.

Our server experts will monitor & maintain your server 24/7 so that it remains lightning fast and secure.

SEE SERVER ADMIN PLANS

var google_conversion_label = "owonCMyG5nEQ0aD71QM";

4 Comments

  1. SharonLynne Gruber

    How do I fix this problem to get my messages sent??

    Reply
    • Sijin George

      Hello SharonLynne,
      Can you please confirm that the sending email address is valid? We will need the detailed error message to troubleshoot further. We’ll be happy to talk to you on chat (click on the icon at right-bottom).

      Reply
  2. Lana lapara

    I am getting that same message. Please help.

    Reply
    • Hiba Razak

      Hello,
      Please contact our support team via live chat(click on the icon at right-bottom).

      Reply

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Categories

Tags

Privacy Preference Center

Necessary

Necessary cookies help make a website usable by enabling basic functions like page navigation and access to secure areas of the website. The website cannot function properly without these cookies.

PHPSESSID - Preserves user session state across page requests.

gdpr[consent_types] - Used to store user consents.

gdpr[allowed_cookies] - Used to store user allowed cookies.

PHPSESSID, gdpr[consent_types], gdpr[allowed_cookies]
PHPSESSID
WHMCSpKDlPzh2chML

Statistics

Statistic cookies help website owners to understand how visitors interact with websites by collecting and reporting information anonymously.

_ga - Preserves user session state across page requests.

_gat - Used by Google Analytics to throttle request rate

_gid - Registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how you use the website.

smartlookCookie - Used to collect user device and location information of the site visitors to improve the websites User Experience.

_ga, _gat, _gid
_ga, _gat, _gid
smartlookCookie
_clck, _clsk, CLID, ANONCHK, MR, MUID, SM

Marketing

Marketing cookies are used to track visitors across websites. The intention is to display ads that are relevant and engaging for the individual user and thereby more valuable for publishers and third party advertisers.

IDE - Used by Google DoubleClick to register and report the website user's actions after viewing or clicking one of the advertiser's ads with the purpose of measuring the efficacy of an ad and to present targeted ads to the user.

test_cookie - Used to check if the user's browser supports cookies.

1P_JAR - Google cookie. These cookies are used to collect website statistics and track conversion rates.

NID - Registers a unique ID that identifies a returning user's device. The ID is used for serving ads that are most relevant to the user.

DV - Google ad personalisation

IDE, test_cookie, 1P_JAR, NID, DV, NID
IDE, test_cookie
1P_JAR, NID, DV
NID
hblid

Security

These are essential site cookies, used by the google reCAPTCHA. These cookies use an unique identifier to verify if a visitor is human or a bot.

SID, APISID, HSID, NID, PREF
SID, APISID, HSID, NID, PREF