Domain example.com has exceeded the max defers and failures per hour

What is this error?

If you are receiving an error similar to Domain example.com has exceeded the max defers and failures per hour (5/5 (100%)) allowed in an email bounceback, it means that outgoing email from your domain has triggered a rule in the server that will stop any further email from going out of the server. This happens when a domain account sends out emails that either fail or get deferred. If the number of failures or defers are greater than the server limit, no further mails are allowed.

How can I fix this?

This error is derived from an hourly monitoring system, where any blocked domains are allowed to send email again at the top of every hour. For example, if you received this error at 2:45pm, the block will release at 3:00pm and the domain will be able to send emails out once more.

4 thoughts on “Domain example.com has exceeded the max defers and failures per hour

  1. “…it means that outgoing email from your domain has triggered a rule in the server that will stop any further email from going out of the server. This happens when a domain account sends out emails that either fail or get deferred.

    How?  Why?  What can we do to prevent this, instead of waiting until the system starts blocking outgoing emails?

    1. How?
      The default limit is typically sufficient for the majority of users. If you or your users are exceeding this limit then you may need to contact technical support to monitor your email usage and determine if it’s a malware issue (automatic email scripts) or if it’s simply a usage issue with you or your users. If you’re on a VPS or dedicated server you can monitor this yourself in WHM, but a Business level host (shared hosting) will require that you request support to do this for you.

      Why?
      Our email servers use a limit on outgoing email because high levels can result in the server being blacklisted and flagged as sources of spam. This would result in your server being unable to deliver email to multiple recipient servers. You can request an increase in the limit, but it will be limited on shared hosting servers. If you want more control over this, then you should be on a VPS or Dedicated server account. However, you will be held responsible for the reputation of your account. Continually outputting thousands of emails for marketing purposes can result in your account being blacklisted by recipient servers. Regular problems with this would then be your responsibility for working to get the server de-listed (for VPS and Dedicated server accounts).

      Prevention
      The best way to stop the problem is to simply be aware of your email output. This is best controlled by monitoring outgoing email numbers on VPS/Dedicated server accounts. On Shared servers, you should provide an expectation to your users by providing information to them for usage limits. If you are trying to send out a mass email, then you may also want to consider third-party solutions such as Mail Chimp which provide free mass mailings to a certain limit. This would free your account from being affected by any outgoing limits. You can also simply space your email deliveries over a period of time.

      I hope this helps to answer your concerns and questions! If you have any further questions or comments, please let us know.

  2. Hi Team,

    Could you please tell how to solve “Domain example.com has exceeded the max defers and failures” issue. Recently most of our clients are facing this issue. On checking logs we could see the error is occuring becase they are sending too many emails than the allowed limit. We later tell our clients to resend the emails a little later. But still they are facing this issue. We cannot tell clients that they cannot send too many emails, they are paying for it . Could you please tell us what needs to be done in such cases.

     

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