On Thu, 26 Jan 1995 12:02:00 EST s.merchant said:
>The first is from Compu$erve (they want $$$$, apparently).  "Postage Due"?!
>That's a new one!
>================
>From: Electronic Postmaster <[log in to unmask]>
>Comments: Returned from:  <[log in to unmask]>
>
>Re: ? EMDRPD - Mail Delivery Failure. Refused -- Postage Due. 76102,3333
>================
 
No, what that (probably) means is that the person in question hasn't paid
his Compu$erve bill.  They charge for incoming Internet messages, and the
subject line always has a little "+Postage Due!" reminder in it--if you
don't read it, they don't charge you...or something like that.  It's very
weird.  So Compu$erve is bouncing the message because the user hasn't
paid--I guess.
 
>The second is a little more disturbing.  It's a terse and unhelpful reply
>to my request to a postmaster to fix their backwards mailers that attempt
>to send messages for 31(!) days, and let you know for that it didn't go
>through the first time only 8 days later!  So you know you have a backlog
>of at least 8 days of bounces even if you delete the person
>immediately.  Just FYI.
>================
<deleted the quoted bounce>
 
Of course he can fix it.  He just doesn't want to (or doesn't know how
to)--or his site guidelines are set in stone and if he changes them he
gets fired (or put on days or something:).  The question is whether or
not it is a "fix" to him.  As far as he's concerned, his system is
working just fine.
 
I had a postmaster somewhere do this to me not long ago.  I felt like
forwarding him all of the bounces when he said he couldn't purge the
user's queue, then at least he would get to suffer right along with
me.  But I didn't do it.  Too time consuming (of my time, not his).
 
Nathan