GMAIL has major Defect – Sending reply email via Web interface fails to include your message and it shows no errors
Posted by presson on February 18, 2008
Yes, you read that right. On two occasions I’ve experienced a problem with Gmail with critical emails I had sent. On two separate occasions I attempted to reply to an email and had a serious problem. I typed my reply, and clicked Send. I walked away with
the satisfaction that gmail said :
Well, it did send a message, but only the quoted text from the original email. My text was gone! What is worse is there was no indication of a problem! It wasn’t until I received a reply from my recipient that there was “no message in your post.”
User error you say? I thought so too, so I re-typed the message, verified the text was there, a moved my mouse and clicked send. It did it again, and finally a third time. I ended up using my hotmail account to send the email, and the message was finally delivered.
I wrote it off as a quirk until today it happened to me again. I tried replying to a message, and the same thing happened. It can’t be spam blocker (the message was delivered, but no text other than the original message.) I then went to my Outlook that is setup as IMAP, and the message sent correctly. I found that there are others who have experienced this problem as well, but everyone is writing off as a spam blocker, but that makes no sense because the message was sent, delivered, received, and read. It just had none of my content.
So beware – and you heard it here first. All I can suggest is check your sent folder and verify the message content is there. It’s been an intermittent problem for me, so you never know when it will happen. I’ll report any progress or response from Google.
Paul said
and oh yes, none of Joe’s indicators are evident in my case…
Paul said
Happens to me all the time, real pain in the proverbial, and doesn’t look like Google is doing anything about it – a clue is finding, in sent mails that you’ve sent yourself an empty mail!!!
Joe said
Actually, I just noticed something important. I have the Gmail Notifier installed on my W2003 computer. The problem only occurs when I click on the icon in the system tray and select ‘Inbox’.
If I simply open the browser and go to Gmail it works fine.
- Joe
Joe said
FYI: I just submitted this information to gmail support.
Joe said
I’m able to reproduce the problem, and have a work around.
Steps to Reproduce:
1. From your Inbox or Sent Mail or any folder click on a message subject to read it.
2. Below the message is a text area where you can type in your reply.
3. Click in the text area. Notice that it loses focus.
4. Click in the text area again and type your reply. Notice that the original message is not there. You may also notice that the font style is different from what it normally is.
5. Click the Send button and notice that your reply is missing, and only the original message was sent out.
Work Around:
Instead of clicking in the text area to compose your reply click the ‘Reply’ or ‘Forward’ link. This seems to be working normal. Verify that the original message is there and the font looks normal.
Hope this helps,
- Joe
Joe said
The exact same thing has started happening to me about a week ago (as far as I now…) Any confirmation from Gmail support? Any resolution? Thanks.
Martina said
I have been having the exact same problem for a few days now and mine is with my hotmail account. does anyone know how to fix the problem?
zxevil160 said
f7dGAJ U cool ))
eggsngrits said
Funny.
Because I generally dislike the web interface for all e-mail programs, my gmail address is permanently forwarded to one of my e-mail accounts that uses POP that I read and edit using MS Outlook. Of course, responses and replies are sent via the other e-mail account, so I’ve never even sent e-mail via gmail!
I guess that qualifies me as an idiot savant…
sciencebase said
I’ve seen lots of messages over the years that had quoted but no body text. Not all of them have been from GMail. I doubt there is anything sinister going on, but maybe there’s a bug somewhere in SMTP that’s been there forever and no one has realized before…
db
b said
Yup, I’ve had it happen also.