one of my clients asked me if I can help with an email issue, they run 2 websites each with an own main email address, but mails from the 2nd domain were just forwarded to the address of the first domain and so they could not respond poperly without confusing the recipient.
of course I told them I'll fix it, I take care and host their site since 10 years or so and they are generally nice people.
so I found out quickly the domain1 address is on gmail services, while domain2 address was on Outlook365, and instead of patching something together using this mess left by my predecessor I decided to make it well manageable and also cheaper for the client. after a call I knew the client manages his mails through the gmail account so my plan was to get rid of Outlook365 services, using my own mail server for the domain2 account and then add the external account to his gmail backend. tested it in my own free gmail account, worked like a charm.
alrighty, domain2 DNS and account all set up and working, now let's add it to gmail. POP3 setup worked fine, but when adding the SMTP settings I got this:
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Functionality not enabled.
You must send emails through xyz.com SMTP servers when you send as blah@xyz.com. However, this functionality is not available for your account. Please contact your domain administrator for more information.went to admin.google.com but couldn't log in with the client address.
after looking at about 30 different (and not exactly helpful) google support pages I figured out that the gmail account is a managed one set up by 3rd party, and 3rd party has the needed privileges to enable the external SMTP function.
another 30 google support pages later: you can not find out the admin address even if it's you paying for the account.
luckily I had forgotten to adjust the WHOIS domain data when transfering domain1 to my services some years ago, and in there I found 2 addresses. when asking the client they said hopefully it's not the 2nd address, something must have happened there before my time. I entered the 1st address into the admin.google.com login aaaand: it asked for a pass. when I had tried that with the client address it was instantly rejected. conclusion: there must be an account.
got in touch with the lady of address1, and she was really nice and helpful, but she could not remember the login credentials, so let's go for a password reset:
- "last password you remember" -> try another way
- "name of your first teacher" -> try another way
- "send verification code" ...there you go.
got the code, google accepted it "but still can not verify it's your account". what?
so I thought maybe you need at least 2 of 3, so I set up a call with the lady with address 1, she named me all 3 teacher names it could be, tried them all plus verification code: "still can not verify it's your account"
aaaaand another 30 google support pages later (seriously, they have no support hotline except for their pricey stuff like GSuite or Workspace) I found at least a request for a callback form which is supposed to work relatively quick: https://support.google.com/a/contact/recovery_form
submitted the info and got a pretty quick respond:
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The reported username address1 does not appear in our systems.
now I have set up a new free gmail account for the client, run both domains through my MX and fetch them both as external accounts through the gmail backend...includes working SMTP. at least I have been able to transfer the contacts and they can keep using the abandoned old account as archive until they can get fully rid of it.
