Sender missing

Problem reported by Skillworks - 7/10/2025 at 9:10 AM

Submitted

We've been waiting since July 2nd for the new software version that fixes the empty sender problem. What's the status? We also received a cancellation from a customer today, and tomorrow I know we'll lose two more.
Is it possible to downgrade users of an existing license?

29 Replies

Reply to Thread

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/10/2025 at 9:16 AM

whats that empty sender?? Can you show an example?

Skillworks Replied

7/10/2025 at 9:21 AM

We tried opening a ticket, but after 10 emails we're still here sending screenshots and explaining the same problem for the 10th time.

Skillworks Replied

7/10/2025 at 9:39 AM

I bought a $300 emergency ticket to show you the problem, I don't think it's fair but if you want this money I'll give it to you.

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/10/2025 at 9:57 AM

We have the same intermittent problem...

And I have reported it a while back.

Derek Curtis Replied

7/10/2025 at 9:57 AM

Employee Post

We've provided multiple troubleshooting steps to one ticket with multiple same-day replies, and the results of our replication attempts in the other. Plus, there was a five day gap where we never heard back from you, not to mention we had a holiday in there. You asked about downgrading (which we normally do not recommend as we want to fix issues and downgrading simply eliminates them without us being able to adequately figure out what's going on) and we responded within 30 minutes of starting our day...and 2 hours later you opened the ER ticket.

I point this out to demonstrate that we're not ignoring the issue, we are being responsive, and to help you understand that customer-specific issues are much more difficult to resolve unless we can replicate them in house. This allows us a greater flexibility when diagnosing what's going on. Seeing it on your server is fine, but there is so much that goes into customer environments it takes time to troubleshoot issues.

Derek Curtis

CCO

SmarterTools Inc.

www.smartertools.com

Skillworks Replied

7/10/2025 at 10:05 AM

Ok, other customer with the same problemm so the problem is not my server.

We are waiting now your solution.

Skillworks Replied

7/10/2025 at 10:10 AM

And this reply all... @Brian Bjerring-Jensen do you have the same issue?

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/10/2025 at 1:19 PM

Nope. Outlook is running fine and its intermittent. Days can pass and then it shows up out of nowhere.

Oliver Replied

7/11/2025 at 2:01 AM

Are the messages where the problems occur signed with SMIME? I sometimes encounter these problems with SMIME-signed messages.

Skillworks Replied

7/11/2025 at 2:37 AM

All the mesage are affliceted, if delete the outlook cache the sender appears but the new message are empty.

I try oulook 2021,2024 (MAPI configuration) same problem... the problem is only for new message, when i see them in the outbox folder the sender is missing, but if i check in webmail i see it.

All users with outlook mapi are afflicted

Skillworks Replied

7/11/2025 at 3:22 AM

If i send the email from my phone in outllok i see the sender corretcly, after delete the outlook cache, when i close outlook and reopen the sender appears.

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/11/2025 at 5:51 AM

Its exactly the behaviour I have reported. But for us its intermittent not permanent.

Oliver Replied

7/11/2025 at 6:17 AM

We are experiencing exactly the same behavior (empty sender), but as far as we can see, only with messages that are signed with SMIME (90% of the emails we use are signed with SMIME). In this context, we also occasionally have the problem that an error window appears with the message “Unable to connect to the server.” Outlook always has to be restarted, after which it usually works.

Please note that in our case, if the sender is empty, the entire message is empty for the recipient.

Unfortunately, a ticket did not help us, as ST was unable to reproduce the problem.

We tested everything: clearing the cache, recreating the profile, using a different PC, deactivating the virus scanner on the client and server, checking the firewall, but unfortunately without success.

Marco DB Replied

7/14/2025 at 1:24 AM

i have some users with this issue too..

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/14/2025 at 7:00 AM

Report it... all of it.

Skillworks Replied

7/14/2025 at 12:17 PM

I male many test, i made for you a virtual machine with the problem so you can make troubleshoting, After 12 days you ask me to check the Outlook configuration.

I think that SM don't want to solve the problem. You can close my ticket.

Derek Curtis Replied

7/14/2025 at 5:45 PM

Employee Post

Yeah, we didn't do that. Missing senders isn't unique to SmarterMail. As such, we do want to troubleshoot as much as we can. We've asked for some small settings changes to help us troubleshoot some more. Previous issues have to do with Outlook add-ins or plug-ins, which the test account has, but there may be more to it. We'll keep looking into it.

Derek Curtis

CCO

SmarterTools Inc.

www.smartertools.com

Skillworks Replied

7/14/2025 at 10:55 PM

after 5 days someone has read my suggestion

05-07-2025 Skilworks

"have you try italian version of outlook?

15-07-2025 SM

"the problem appears to stem from improperly formed MIME headers being generated by Outlook, specifically when using the Italian language locale"

and now how many day to solve?

to be continued..........

Marco DB Replied

7/14/2025 at 11:19 PM

can confirm that we are on italian language too

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/15/2025 at 1:47 AM

We are using english and UTF-8

Oliver Replied

7/15/2025 at 3:23 AM

We use the German language. We have already deactivated all plugins and tested many other suggestions without success.

Our ticket 31B-2FA5F51A-0001 has been closed in the meantime, as ST was unfortunately unable to reproduce the issue.

Most of the time it works, but then for some unknown reason an error message appears

and after several attempts the message is sent and appears in the sent folder without a sender, and the recipient receives a blank message.

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

7/15/2025 at 9:25 AM

Coming and going with no logic attached to it...

Skillworks Replied

7/17/2025 at 2:04 PM

I try to use https://www.dimastr.com/outspy/download.htm OutlookSpy, i'm not able to use, it is the first time.

After a quick analysis it seems that the email generated by Outlook does not have the complete "property tags" (PR_SENDER_NAME_W is missing), in the old emails (and those generated by emclient) I see that there is the PR_SENDER_NAME_W field

Skillworks Replied

7/17/2025 at 2:14 PM

PR_SENDER_NAME_W is not the only property tag that is missing, there are many others, and at first glance it would seem that some missing fields were present in old emails made with Outlook.

Skillworks Replied

7/18/2025 at 4:35 AM

I have installed windows 11 and office english version in a laptop i have the same problem, reply all not working and sender missing, i don't understand how you are unable to replicate the problem.