I'm getting duplicate emails (two copies)

--VQ-- · Site Admin Joined: 06 Jan 2003 Posts: 474

Question: Why am I Receiving Multiple Copies of my mail?

Answer: There are 4 possibilities. All are easily corrected.

You may be routing mail into your vqME mailbox using two methods at the same time: both POP and Forward. Vanquish does not prevent you from this configuration error, because the forwarding of mail (the preferred technique) is configured by you at your own ISP or hosted mail service. This tip explains how to stop our server from POPping mail from your outside address.

Two other possibilities are easily corrected in your email program settings.

If you receive two copies of good email, but you also receive spam without the gray control stripe at the top, then the you have duplicate accounts in your email program. One is retrieving mail from the vqME server after it has been cleaned, while the other is fighting with our server to fetch it directly from your ISP. Simply delete or disable the one that is fetching mail directly from your ISP or mail domain.

Incidentally, this also indicates that you are using "POP" to transfer incoming mail from your email service to vqME. This is slow and inefficient. This change will deliver your mail instantly.
On the other hand, if you are not getting spam, but you receive multiple copies of clean mail with a Control Stripe at top, then you may have two or more email program accounts fetching from the same clean mailbox at vqME.

The solution is to make one or more of your email program accounts "inactive" so they don't pick up mail. That's because vqME is already consolidating you mail into one mailbox. Use the method that meets your needs:

Method #1: If the mail that arrives in duplicate is always for the same person (that is, you do not need to keep the mail separate for collection at different times - or by different PCs), then make all but one of your email program accounts inactive. But do not delete them from your email program configuration. [Explain]

Method #2: If you wish to keep mail for various protected addresses separate (for example, if it is for a different person or a different PC), then go to your vqME configuration page and split the addresses across separate vqME profiles. That is, delete the protected address under one "profile address" and then add it back under a new profile address. In this case, Vanquish will not combine the mail in advance.

This tip shows how to consolidate or separate mailboxes
Finally, you may be pre-forwarding mail through other addresses before it arrives at the security server. This results in all sorts of problems - not just duplicate mail - and it violates the EULA and service terms of both vqME and vqNow. Fortunately, the problem is easy to correct.