Message bounced due to SENDER is disabled

[LinU777]

Hello. We have very strange behavior with messages sent from external user to our group.

mydomain.com - our domain in Google Workspace
extdomain.com - client domain, not in Workspace

So external user extuser1@extdomain.com sending mail to our user user1@mydomain.com and CC to group1@mydomain.com. user1@mydomain.com get this message delivered, but group1@mydomain.com not. This is what in Email Log Search:

Sender:
extuser1@extdomain.com
Recipient:
2 recipients
user1@mydomain.com
group1@mydomain.com

user1@mydomain.com
May 26, 2022, 11:52:12 PM
1 seconds
Delivered to Gmail mailbox
May 26, 2022, 11:52:11 PM
Received from an SMTP server with IP address: ip.ip.ip.ip (TLS enabled)
250 2.0.0 OK
May 26, 2022, 11:52:11 PM
Inserted into Gmail delivery pipeline
May 26, 2022, 11:52:12 PM
Delivered to Gmail mailbox
No Error

group1@mydomain.com
May 26, 2022, 11:52:12 PM
1 seconds
Bounced
May 26, 2022, 11:52:11 PM
Received from an SMTP server with IP address: ip.ip.ip.ip (TLS enabled)
250 2.0.0 OK
May 25, 2022, 11:52:11 PM
Inserted into Gmail delivery pipeline
May 25, 2022, 11:52:12 PM
Bounced
The account <a href="mailto:extuser1@extdomain.com" target="_blank">extuser1@extdomain.com</a> is disabled.

So message is bounced due to external user extuser1@extdomain.com is disabled.
extuser1@extdomain.com even not in group group1@mydomain.com, why do gmail servers even check if user is enabled?
How to stop these strange checks?

[chris_barrow4]

Check the Group Access settings and ensure that eternal users can post to the group.

[LinU777]

 @chris_barrow4 already checked. Didn't mention it earlier, mail from other external senders delivered normally

[nicoleqq]

We have the exact same issue.

[Jan-Carlos]

Hello!

I found this documentation about this:

https://apps.google.com/supportwidget/articlehome?hl=en&article_url=https%3A%2F%2Fsupport.google.com...

[LinU777]

@Jan-Carlos Hi!

No, all users in group are active. Also message is bounced due to external account is disabled.

[nicoleqq]

We contacted Google support, and they were able to identify the issue. It turned out that the sender's email was the alternate email address of a disabled account. They also explained why sender can send email to Google user, but not group(see screenshot).

[tbwhm]

Thanks for posting the response from Google @nicoleqq.We have the same issue. It sounds like Google support did not offer a solution or workaround?

[Zare]

we're also having this same exact issue 

[vyvergil]

We are also seeing this when one specific outside user emails our support address. 

[auctane-rpesta]

We are seeing this issue as well. Any luck with a solution?

[FFurci]

I've just posted on the same problem.

"Valid emails messages bounce when sent to groups"

It's incredible that the only solution is reactivate an account the user probably do not know anymore, and none realize that this is wrong, should be aplpied only to user that send mail via google server...

[KAM]

@FFurci Sender validation makes sure your domain isn't being spoofed and you don't need to reactive the account.  Just add the email as an alias to an active account if you need. HTH -KAM

[FFurci]

Simply I cannot add an alias sender@otherdomain.com to a my workspace accont@mydomain.com....

[besttech]

I am having the totally same issue.  An external sender (customer) has their email rejected/bounced back to them when they send email to a workspace group, but if they send to an individual workspace user, it is received just fine.

The group is able to receive other external email from many many external addresses but not this particular one.  I checked for banned/suspended group users and they are not on the list.  I have set whitelists/allow lists in the admin panel but still when checking email logs it states:

Jul 11, 2023, 9:58:08 AM

Inserted into Gmail delivery pipeline

Bounced

The account sender@otherdomain.com is disabled.

 sender@otherdomain.com is not a user, alias, etc we have nothing to do with otherdomain.com, they are our customer.

[Hanss]

Here's the translation in English:

I too have encountered the exact same issue.
I am a member of a Google Workspace environment and regularly send emails from a sender@otherdomain.com to groups within the Google Workspace account. This always worked perfectly until recently. Suddenly, sending to groups failed and the diagnostic data consistently displayed the message: "The account sender@otherdomain.com is disabled."

This led me to try logging into Google with the "sender@otherdomain.com" account, even though I'm certain I never created an account with this email address.
Attempting to login or create an account with the email address sender@otherdomain.com was unsuccessful, and I received the following message:
"Your account has been turned off. It appears that this account has been used in a way that violates Google's policies.
This account has not been available since September 8, 2023.
The account may be deleted after August 3, 2024.
If you believe your account has been wrongly deactivated, please file an appeal as soon as possible."
I promptly filed an appeal using the "start appeal" button and explained the situation.

After two days, I received an email with the following message:
"Thank you for contacting us regarding your suspended Google account. Upon review, we have approved your request to restore access.
If you wish to recover your account, you need to log in and verify the account as soon as possible."

Following that, I created a Google account with the email address sender@otherdomain.com, which now worked without any issues.

Since then, sending to groups in Google Workspace using the address sender@otherdomain.com works perfectly again.

[bztrsverkooijen]

I think this is the issue, the user has created a gmail.com account and linked their address as an alternative emailaddress. That account got blocked, or set disabled.

https://knowledge.workspace.google.com/kb/issues-when-external-user-send-emails-to-a-group-000005035

[FFurci]

In my case, probably in the past the user had an account workspace, leaving it without deletion when the domain migrated to other mail provider.

Or perhaps never had an gmail account, but some times ago Google permitted to create account to use several its services (not mail) using an "external" email.
Then the Google's policy about unused account disabled this user, and so the error.

All right, but if this user uses its mail servers (not Gmail ones) to send email, and these server are authorized by SPF or DKIM, what is the reason to block it, and only for groups...?

[bztrsverkooijen]

I agree, it makes little sense to block for groups only.

You can still link your own emailadres to a free gmail account, we use this for some specific solutions. 

[jonahgreenthal]

I ended up working around this by stopping using groups at all for public-facing stuff, instead using lower-level routing rules. It loses most of the features of groups, but it is arguably easier to set up. To do this, from the admin home page, go to Apps > Google Workspace > Gmail on the left navigation, then Routing at the bottom, then use the "Email forwarding using recipient address map" section.

[tbwhm]

Good solution, thank you.

[bztrsverkooijen]

Thanks, this works better than the group in our case.

They just get forwarded to a ticketing solution, no need for an archive in a group

[FFurci]

Thanks for suggestion, I'll try to play with this feature in the next days, but in effect seems to be useful!