Legitimate emails sent to spam folder

[aircraft]

Hi,

I have a problem where a lot of my incoming emails are being sent to the spam folder. None of these are actually spam. I have Thunderbird set up on my computer to collect my mail from Talktalk but it will only get mail from the Talktalk inbox. I keep having to log into talktalk webmail just to move my mail from Spam to Inbox.

Can you either fix your spam filtering or disable it please?

[Billx]

Hi, @aircraft 

Thank you for your reply on ‎06-06-2025 05:23 PM  I somehow missed it, or not got a notification.

Can you please give a little more detail?

You already had an existing POP3 account in Thunderbird, using a TalkTalk email address

But you opened an additional IMAP account in Thunderbird.

Is this new account, using the same TalkTalk email address? Is Thunderbird able to open both a POP3 and an IMAP account on the same email address?

When you get all your emails from the POP3 account, what if anything remains in the IMAP account?

Also, noting that there are 6 standard folders in TalkTalk webmail,

are the only emails still left and showing in the IMAP account, all in the Spam folder?

Are there any emails left in any of the other folders?

I am asking because a POP3 account would want to download everything, and then delete everything.

The IMAP would want to download everything, but leave copies of everything on the server. (a conflict?)

Thanking you,

Bill

[Billx]

Hi @nambuso-TT 

I assume by 'safe senders list', you mean the 'Allowlist' in TalkTalk webmail Settings/Mail/AccessLists

Now you are saying, that if one sets 'yourbill @ billing.talktalk.co.uk' as an entry in the Allowlist',

 it will stop any emails going to one's spam folder.

How could this be? It will stop only 'yourbill @ billing.talktalk.co.uk' emails going to one's spam folder.

What about the thousands of other email addresses?

Bill

[Gliwmaeden2]

@nambuso-TT, I noticed this answer on another staff reply elsewhere. 

In neither instance did it appear to have any relevance to the general problem. 

Customers adding that address will only be approving the arrival of their billing email. How can it solve the general issue?

[nambuso-TT]

I am very sorry to hear this, could you please Add our email address yourbill@billing.talktalk.co.uk to your contacts or safe senders list - this will stop any emails going to your spam or junk folder. Thanks

[aircraft]

Hi Billx, no this never got sorted. They just stopped talking to me!

I was accessing my email from the talktalk server using POP3 via Thunderbird. However, only emails from the talktlak Inbox were retrieved. If Thunderbird had been able to get the emails from the talktalk Spam folder, it wouldn't have been such a problem. Maybe I could have run a local rule to move them automatically. Anyway, that didn't seem to be an option.

So, as a sort of workaround, I added a new Thunderbird account to the talktalk server but this time using IMAP. Whilst I still couldn't run a rule on the talktalk Spam folder automatically, at least I can see when there are emails in the talktalk Spam folder from Thunderbird and then just move them manually. That's an inprovement on having to log into talktalk webmail to do it.

Thanks for your help.

[Billx]

Hi, @aircraft 

Has this been sorted?

If so, how?

There could be a problem, because @aircraft uses POP3 and not IMAP.

I think many people now are using IMAP and not POP3. I haven't used POP3 for a long time.

If it's a POP3 account, do some of the emails still go to SPAM, like in IMAP? It seems according to @aircraft, they do.

Since in POP3, all emails are regularly downloaded and deleted from the server, then why are the spam emails left behind. It doesn't make any sense. There wouldn't be any emails in any of the other folders, just in Inbox folder and Spam folder. So in POP3, the emails in both of those 2 folders should be downloaded together and deleted on the server, after downloading.

I have now achieved 0 spam emails for a week.

I am using both TalkTalk webmail and Thunderbird.

(Previously, I used to use TalkTalk webmail and Microsoft Outlook

There were quite a few deficiencies in Microsoft Outlook.)

Bill

[KeithFrench]

Hi @aircraft 

Apology accepted.

[aircraft]

Keith, sorry you misunderstood me!

Yesterday, I thanked you for your help. The talktalk support person said in replay - thanks, you're welcome. To which I replied - no, not you, Keith. Meaning talktalk had not helped at all but you had.

But I can see how that could be misconstrued by my punctuation. Anyway, it was you I was thanking, even though in the end it didn't get me a solution. talktalk wasted hours of my time and didn't hekp at all.

[KeithFrench]

Hi @aircraft 

I do not appreciate your last post. Please note that I haven't been able to help you, because it is not possible for another customer to fix a TalkTalk system's problem. My suggestions were only made as a workaround.

[aircraft]

Not you, Keith! You haven't helped me at all!

[siphosethu-TT]

Thank you KeithFrench for the help. Thanks

[aircraft]

Keith,

I have tried your rule method to move to move emails from Spam to Inbox but unfortunately it doesn't work. Although a rules can be applied manually to any folder, they can only be applied automatically to the Inbox.

From Thunderbird Help:

What folders are filtered?

When you select to run a Thunderbird filter manually you can apply the filter to a specific folder. This is not possible for the automatic execution of filters.

Automatically applied filters are applied only to the inbox, with the exception of Archive and after send filters, which apply only to the mails involved in the action to send or archive. Other folder types are not affected.

So this has a similar issue to Billx' suggestion earlier. Once the email is in the Spam folder, it is too late to do anything about it. Since Thunderbird only executes a rule when it detects its arrival at the server, it can't intervene before.

I think. But thanks for trying to help!

[aircraft]

POP Mail Server

Server Name: mail.talktalk.net      Port: 995

SMTP:  smtp.talktalk.net

[siphosethu-TT]

Look for "IMAP" or "POP3" to find the incoming mail server and "SMTP" for outgoing mail. Thanks

[aircraft]

Okay, I'm in my mail settings.

[aircraft]

Of course the email was sent successfully. It arrived at my talktalk mailbox! The only peoblwm is it was sent to the Spam folder not the Inbox.

[siphosethu-TT]

I'm really sorry about this, I understand that this must be frustrating for you, but I'll need you to stay with me until we finish these few steps. Please go to your incoming mail settings and confirm once you there. Thanks

[Billx]

Hi, @siphosethu-TT 

All these questions you've been asking @aircraft are inappropriate, for the problem at hand.

Bill

[siphosethu-TT]

I'll also need you to go to your settings, to the incoming mail folder please. Thanks

[siphosethu-TT]

I want you to speak to the email sender and confirm if they were able to sent the email successfully or are they seeing error message when sending it.

Is the email sent successfully by the sender? Thanks