This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start working again.
Any idea why?
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start working again.
Any idea why?
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start
working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
On 15/08/2026 09:09, Alan B wrote:
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday.-a I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from-a a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start >>> working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
I agree.
ISTR you're with Plusnet, and I have
On 15/08/2026 09:09, Alan B wrote:
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start >> working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
I agree.
ISTR you're with Plusnet, and I have regular issues with the Internet
going down - for me it was the same time every night, although only for
a short time. They never did get to the bottom of it.
Can you try using a different DNS server perhaps? Just a thought, maybe worth a try, and easy enough to do.
Go into the Router's Admin settings, and the IPv4 settings, and add an alternative DNS service there. Or you can
Perhaps the best to try are either Cloudflare (enter 1.1.1.1 for
primary, and 1.0.0.1 for secondary - you can also use 1.1.1.2 and
1.0.0.2 for malware filtering), or maybe Quad9 9.9.9.9 if you like Swiss based services.
It might at least eliminate the PN servers as the issue.
On 15/08/2026 09:09, Alan B wrote:
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start >> working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
I agree.
ISTR you're with Plusnet, and I have regular issues with the Internet
going down - for me it was the same time every night, although only for
a short time. They never did get to the bottom of it.
Can you try using a different DNS server perhaps? Just a thought, maybe
worth a try, and easy enough to do.
Go into the Router's Admin settings, and the IPv4 settings, and add an alternative DNS service there. Or you can
Perhaps the best to try are either Cloudflare (enter 1.1.1.1 for
primary, and 1.0.0.1 for secondary - you can also use 1.1.1.2 and
1.0.0.2 for malware filtering), or maybe Quad9 9.9.9.9 if you like Swiss based services.
It might at least eliminate the PN servers as the issue.
Andy Hewitt <thewildrover@icloud.com> wrote:
On 15/08/2026 09:09, Alan B wrote:
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday. >>>>
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start >>>> working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
I agree.
ISTR you're with Plusnet, and I have regular issues with the Internet
going down - for me it was the same time every night, although only for
a short time. They never did get to the bottom of it.
Can you try using a different DNS server perhaps? Just a thought, maybe
worth a try, and easy enough to do.
Go into the Router's Admin settings, and the IPv4 settings, and add an
alternative DNS service there. Or you can
Perhaps the best to try are either Cloudflare (enter 1.1.1.1 for
primary, and 1.0.0.1 for secondary - you can also use 1.1.1.2 and
1.0.0.2 for malware filtering), or maybe Quad9 9.9.9.9 if you like Swiss
based services.
It might at least eliminate the PN servers as the issue.
I've changed to 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1 and th 'eoutlook.com' address that previoulsy bounced is now working - but that might be because the fault usually gets corrected on Sunday afternoons. I'll run it for a week
like this and see what happens next weekend.
The other difference I have noticed is the speed of fetching e-mails. :
Over the past year there have been longer and longer delays, now I have altered the DNS settings, the response is almost immediate.
Unfortunately Gmail still bounce e-mails to their customers as usual,
but that is a different problem.
On 16/08/2026 19:15, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Andy Hewitt <thewildrover@icloud.com> wrote:
On 15/08/2026 09:09, Alan B wrote:
On 2026-08-14, Liz Tuddenham <liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid> wrote: >>>> This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday. >>>>
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start >>>> working again.
Any idea why?
You could contact your ISP and email service provider as the issues
seem external to your home network.
I agree.
ISTR you're with Plusnet, and I have regular issues with the Internet
going down - for me it was the same time every night, although only for
a short time. They never did get to the bottom of it.
Can you try using a different DNS server perhaps? Just a thought, maybe
worth a try, and easy enough to do.
Go into the Router's Admin settings, and the IPv4 settings, and add an
alternative DNS service there. Or you can
Perhaps the best to try are either Cloudflare (enter 1.1.1.1 for
primary, and 1.0.0.1 for secondary - you can also use 1.1.1.2 and
1.0.0.2 for malware filtering), or maybe Quad9 9.9.9.9 if you like Swiss >> based services.
It might at least eliminate the PN servers as the issue.
I've changed to 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1 and th 'eoutlook.com' address that previoulsy bounced is now working - but that might be because the fault usually gets corrected on Sunday afternoons. I'll run it for a week
like this and see what happens next weekend.
Hmm, it's definitely weird, and does sound like its an ISP issue. Can
only wait and see I suppose.
The other difference I have noticed is the speed of fetching e-mails. : Over the past year there have been longer and longer delays, now I have altered the DNS settings, the response is almost immediate.
Unfortunately Gmail still bounce e-mails to their customers as usual,
but that is a different problem.
Must admit I never had issues with Gmail, although I don't actually use
it for Email at all now, and only ever had it as a backup service anyway.
If you want to risk possible privacy invasion (who knows!) you could try
the Google DNS 8.8.8.8.
But, you have a starting point. If it fails next week, you know it's not
the DNS server.
Andy Hewitt <thewildrover@icloud.com> wrote:
I've changed to 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1 and th 'eoutlook.com' address that
previoulsy bounced is now working - but that might be because the fault
usually gets corrected on Sunday afternoons. I'll run it for a week
like this and see what happens next weekend.
Hmm, it's definitely weird, and does sound like its an ISP issue. Can
only wait and see I suppose.
The other difference I have noticed is the speed of fetching e-mails. :
Over the past year there have been longer and longer delays, now I have
altered the DNS settings, the response is almost immediate.
Unfortunately Gmail still bounce e-mails to their customers as usual,
but that is a different problem.
Must admit I never had issues with Gmail, although I don't actually use
it for Email at all now, and only ever had it as a backup service anyway.
I have never used it. The issue is that e-mails which I send to gmail addresses are rejected by gmail, I cannot reply to anyone who contacts
me from a gmail address. When this first started happening there was no 'bounce' message and I only discovered it when I contacted people by
other methods and found they hadn't been receiving my e-mails.
I have tried forwarding my e-mails to gmail addresses from iLetter
running on a Mac Mini on the same router and these sometimes get through
(but not always).
If you want to risk possible privacy invasion (who knows!) you could try
the Google DNS 8.8.8.8.
I am horroified to say that is what it was set to - I think that was on
the advice of the Plusnet helpline but they didn;t tell me it was Google
or I wouldn't have done it.
On 14/08/2026 19:33, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start
working again.
Any idea why?
ChatGPT wrote this in answer to your question:-
On 14/08/2026 19:33, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
This afternoon my internet crashed, as it seems to do nearly every
Friday. I rebooted the router and then started getting 'bounced'
e-mails from a number of addresses - as seems to happen every Friday.
Based on past experience, this state of affairs will persist until
Sunday afternoon and then those e-mail addresses will mysteriously start
working again.
Any idea why?
ChatGPT wrote this in answer to your question:-
=
Yes. The pattern Liz describes is actually quite suggestive. The key
point is that **the Internet connection recovering on Friday/Sunday and particular email addresses becoming unreachable at the same time is
unlikely to be a coincidence**.
The most plausible explanations are:
1. **Her ISP/router is losing its Internet connection or changing its
public IP address.**
If the router reconnects with a different IP address, some mail
systems can temporarily reject connections from it, particularly if the
new IP has a poor reputation or appears on a dynamic/block list.
2. **Her outgoing SMTP server is becoming inaccessible.**
If the bounced messages are *outgoing* emails, the important
question is what the bounce actually says. A router reboot would restore Internet access, but it wouldn't necessarily fix an SMTP authentication, port, DNS, or ISP-mail-server problem.
3. **DNS failure is a strong possibility.**
If she can browse some websites but mail to particular domains
fails, her DNS resolver could be returning incorrect or unavailable MX records. A router reboot can change/reset DNS state, which would explain
the apparent connection with rebooting the router.
4. **The rCLFriday raA SundayrCY pattern is particularly interesting.**
If it happens repeatedly at approximately the same time every Friday
and resolves approximately the same time every Sunday, I'd suspect
something *scheduled* rather than a random router failure. For example,
an ISP maintenance/routing problem, a service being restarted, or a mail provider imposing some temporary restriction.
5. **rCLBouncedrCY needs clarification.**
There is a major distinction between:
* the email being rejected immediately by her own mail server;
* her mail server being unable to connect to the recipient's mail
server;
* the recipient's server explicitly rejecting her message; and
* the message being accepted but subsequently returned as undeliverable.
The **bounce message itself should contain the answer**, or at least
narrow it down considerably. In particular, the SMTP status code rCo such
as `550`, `554`, `421`, `451`, `450`, etc. rCo and the text immediately following it are extremely valuable.
So I would ask Liz to post **one complete bounce message**, with her own
and the recipient's personal addresses redacted if she wishes. From that
we can usually tell whether this is DNS, SMTP, ISP blocking,
recipient-side rejection, IP reputation, or something else.
And there is one particularly useful diagnostic she could do next time
it happens: **without rebooting the router, try sending an email to one
of the addresses that normally fails, then immediately try sending to an address that normally works.** If one succeeds and the other fails, that points strongly toward a recipient-domain/DNS/mail-routing issue rather
than the Internet connection itself.
So I recommend that you do not post ChatGDP reports here unless you are using ChatGDP+ or have verified them. And even ChatGDP+ is liable to errors.
David, which version of ChatGDP are you using, the free one or ChatGDP+?
I asked the free one (I don't use it enough to justify -u240 p/a) about some pottery and it got it completely wrong.
My son in Canada pays (about the same equvalemt) and his ChatGDP 5.8 actually thought about it for some minutes and then got it right - absolutely spot on. (So did my version of Gemini, FWIW)
When corrected, my free version was initially inclined to argue but eventually
admitted it had gone astray and came as close as a machine can to an apology.
And it's not the first time, either for me or other family members. The free ChatGDP is unreliable. As is all AI, of course, to an extent.
So I recommend that you do not post ChatGDP reports here unless you are using ChatGDP+ or have verified them. And even ChatGDP+ is liable to errors.
| Sysop: | Amessyroom |
|---|---|
| Location: | Fayetteville, NC |
| Users: | 74 |
| Nodes: | 6 (0 / 6) |
| Uptime: | 53:34:06 |
| Calls: | 1,101 |
| Calls today: | 1 |
| Files: | 1,339 |
| Messages: | 276,196 |