Sent email not showing in Sent folder

[#1]

I spoke too soon the other day, when I said the problem cured in another thread flagged as Fixed....

Whenever I sent any mail from my plusnet email account using an email client (Win 10 default, thunderbird, Windows live etc) on windows or ipad the sent items are never shown.

The only time it does, is if I've used the webmail interface which I don't use - it was simply a test I conducted.

I've tried different identities on the mailbox and it makes no difference. Does the mailbox need resetting by Plusnet to get this working and / or can I raise a ticket about this - there seems no option when following the troubleshooter other than to speak to someone (long delays) or live chat (not an active option).

The sent messages are all delivered to their destination.

Grateful for any help on this....

[#2]

Hi Graham, can you send us a screengrab of your settings from one of the email clients you've tried using please? - Adam 

[#3]

[#4]

If it helps, the thunderbird diagnostic is saying the server responds to the move with "invalid mailbox" when trying to move the email to the sent folder....

[#5]

[#6 · Accepted solution]

Have now resolved the thunderbird client. A combination of sent folder not created until an ipad client was used and confusion over default folders in thunderbird for imap folders seemed to cause the issue.

[#7]

A post-script summary of email success/failure to last night's closure post....

- Thunderbird could be configured to work

- Windows Live Mail on Win 7 would not work correctly by recording sent mail. It would however show sent mail folder items that were sent using other mail clients. To get WLM to record sent mail I had to change the IMAP root to INBOX which of course, loses the Inbox!, so that was interesting, but of no use. The only way I could get the send mail to be successfully moved, was to use POP...but that of course is only local retention of sent items on that one PC.So again, not of any use for multiple device sync mailboxes for plusnet mail.

- Apple iOS worked out of the box as it were..

- Win 10 default mail app - same as live mail (from the Microsoft stable again of course) and no means to configure it to map onto server folders...so no sent mail recorded when sent by this client, but it did show sent mail, that was created by other imap clients e.g. Thunderbird.

Hope that makes sense!

[#8]

This experience points to the little understood fact that when a new mailbox is created, the special folders draft / sent / trash are not created.

Different email clients may or may not create them. Different email clients use different names if they create them (for example Win10 mail creates “Sent Items” others are just named “Sent”), some clients will use what’s already there, others expect a fixed name. For example Win10 will only use “Sent Items”.

If Win10 email is to be used, it is wise to create a new email and send it, then delete it BEFORE connecting any other email client to the mail box.

Note Win10 email will not use the server Drafts folder.

[#9]

Certainly the lack of folder creation was apparent via the iOS Mail with only the inbox visible and the other clients as you say all do things differently.

I'm curious about the the Win 10 mail though.... Is this only for the first default mailbox in Plusnet or can any that you create afterwards? I've just created another email address with plusnet, waited the 30+ minute creation time and then sent an email from Win 10 (not other client setup) and it does exactly as before, email is sent, arrives at the destination but nothing appears in any sent or sent items folder.

[#10]

I have just created a new mail box.

Linked to it using Win10 mail BEFORE doing anything with any other client.

I deleted the Plusnet email address has been created email

I sent an email.

Indeed it did not automatically appear in the SENT ITEMS folder … but it did appear there when refreshing the folder.

I then accessed the new mail box using Webmail … then a total muddle ensued … it created the usual default SENT and Trash folders used by Round Cube.  Looking at the IMAP store using Telnet reported...

* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Trash"
* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Spam"
* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Sent"
* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Drafts"
* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Deleted Items"
* LIST (\HasNoChildren) "." "INBOX.Sent Items"
* LIST (\Unmarked \HasChildren) "." "INBOX"

The two in blue are those which Win10 Email uses … which are not the same as those used by Webmail (and most other email clients).

Personally I would NEVER recommend Win10 mail in circumstances where there is a requirement to be able to access the same email box using another device (client).  It using different folder names is not the only issue here, it is not possible to change which real folders are used as the special folders (unlike most other email clients including Webmail) and it will never place DRAFT emails into the server's draft folder.

Use Win10 Email with great caution.

[#11]

Certainly the lack of folder creation was apparent via the iOS Mail with only the inbox visible and the other clients as you say all do things differently

When a new email account is created on the Plusnet host, only the INBOX is created.

Most (but not all) Email clients will create the other folders either on initial connection OR when they are required, for example on the first send, save or delete.

Personally I create a new email address and then log into it using WEBMAIL FIRST.  That creates the Trash / Spam / Sent / Drafts folders as sub-directories of INBOX as shown above.

After that MOST email clients will recognise those folders and use them as the SPECIAL FOLDERS rather than creating their own.

If for example one were to connect with Outlook 2016 FIRST, the folders created would be Deleted Items / Junk / Sent Items / Drafts.

In short, what these folders are called can be a lottery, out of which things do not work quite as expected across multiple clients.

[#12]

Thanks Townman - I will try again this morning, but as I only used the Win10 default mail client last time to access the new mailbox, (and the sent items folder was created), but no entries appeared after sending an email, I'm not sure why this wouldn't work.

I also didn't go into webmail, just in case it created folders that conflicted.

Updated.... Ok that gave exactly the same result as before...sent items folder created but no sent emails appear in that folder...incoming emails work fine.

[#13]

Did you use the refresh button on the sent items folder?

[#14]

Hi, Yes, tried the refresh/sync several times I'm afraid.

[#15]

This might be a Microsoft issue - see https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-files/sent-emails-not-being-saved-in-se...