TalkTalk email spam filter unfit for purpose

[Rampak]

The TalkTalk spam filter is putting about 75% of my legitimate emails into my spam folder. This started happening a few weeks ago and is becoming very irksome.

Emails from well-known sources such as Amazon, Which?, LV Insurance and, to cap it all TalkTalk themselves is going into my spam folder (e.g. email from TalkTalk with details of their new terms and conditions - spam according to them!)

Not only that but real, glaringly obvious spam is still getting through.

I cannot conceive why TalkTalk have given NO opportunities for their subscribers to manage the spam filter - it's ridiculous.

One reason I have stayed with TalkTalk so long is to avoid the hassle of changing my email - well if this continues I will be forced to set up a new email account elsewhere anyway, then I'll have no more reason not to look round for a better ISP.

[Rampak]

Yes, TalkTalk Business account. I must admit I didn't realise TalkTalk had two different types of webmail.

I too would expect the filters here to work as you say, but obviously the system is using some opaque method of deciding for itself what is spam and what isn't as well - this is very annoying because it is beyond my control!

It looks like I might have to phone customer support.

Incidentally it continues to put reply notifications from the forum into my spam folder from where I have to retrieve them before downloading to my email client.

Thanks for your time anyway, I appreciate it.

[Gondola]

Hi @Rampak

My references were to TalkTalk webmail which is what Community Home customers use.

You've shown a TalkTalk Business webmail screenshot. Do we assume you're a TalkTalk Business customer?

I see the filters and they're effectively working in the same way as the Blocked Senders Filter will act when someone using TalkTalk webmail hits the Spam button.

But we don't use the Business webmail interface here so I've no experience of its failings in the way you've described. Sorry about that.

[Rampak]

I can't see the Settings as you describe. I've attached a screenshot of my front page. If I select options I get an option to select filters, nothing described as a blocked senders list, but some filter rules which will delete or move mail to specified folder. I only had 9 rules, 6 of which were the same so I have removed those. None of the filter options referred to any of the messages that are being put in my spam folder.

[Gondola]

Hi @Rampak

The Safe Senders List is only on an email client not webmail.

In Webmail to manage Blocked Senders and set up filtering to, for example, move wanted email into specific folders you'd:

• Click on Settings (left panel)
• Click on Mail
• Scroll down to Filters
• Select Blocked Senders Filter
• Click Edit to check and edit the contents
  you'll need pop-ups enabled

As Ady said, if there are more than 50 Blocked senders the operation of receiving email and checking for a blocked address can have unpredictable results.

[Rampak]

These messages are not being sent to my email client spam, they are being sent to TalkTalk webmail spam, so they never get to my email client unless I specifically log on to TalkTalk webmail and manually move them to my inbox. It rather defeats the object of using a POP3 email client!.

How do I set up a safe senders list on TalkTalk webmail manager? I can't see anywhere I can set message rules on TalkTalk webmail.

[Gondola]

Hi @Rampak

Have you considered adding the wanted email addresses to your email client's Safe Sender's List?  That's there so mail doesn't get sent to Spam.

[Rampak]

MailWasher lets me look at subject lines and detailed email data about the source of the mail in my INBOX before downloading to my POP3 account. Any unwanted ones can be deleted before they even get to my computer.

That's why I dont need any filtering of messages before they get to my inbox.

By the way, so far I've had three responses to my post on this forum; guess where I found them - that's right, in my spam folder!

[Rampak]

Right I've added my email and my wife's. Both of these are affected by this.

Maybe there are more than 50 email addresses in my blocked senders list, I've no idea.

If there are then I don't know how they got there. I haven't put them in!

I've got no filter options set, and I can't see any way to manage a blocked senders list.

[Ady-TalkTalk]

Hi Rampak, please add the affected email address to the private notes section of your community profile. Once you have post back to let me know. If I had to bet what's wrong I'd say that you've got more than 50 email addresses in your blocked senders list. 

[Gondola]

Hi @Rampak

Please ensure your Community Profile Personal Information (Click here) includes your email address - scroll down and add that to Private Notes and save changes. The TalkTalk Community support OCE will then be able to link to your TalkTalk email account to see what's going on.

I have no experience of the Mailwasher program you use to screen emails so I don't know whether this is impacting the way that your mail is mostly going in to the Spam folder.