How to fix Spam Complaints

What is a spam complaint? 

A spam complaint occurs when a recipient marks an email as spam or moves an email to their spam/junk folder after successful delivery. In some cases, recipients may do this by accident and will be unaware of the consequences that result from it. A spam complaint is not caused by an email going directly to a recipient's spam/junk folder due to recipient email filtering, it must be manually triggered by the recipient. 

SMTP2GO has a very low tolerance for spam complaint levels with further detail covered on the Bounce/Spam Percentages and Ratings article. If your spam complaint level is too high, you risk account suspension and it can also harm your sender reputation which can affect your deliverability overall. 

What happens when a spam complaint occurs?

If a recipient marks an email as "spam" or moves it to the spam/junk folder, SMTP2GO is notified and a block will be placed on the recipient's email address in your account which will show on the "Reports > Suppressions" page.



The spam complaint event will show on your "Reports > Activity" page (visible for 5 days for free plan accounts and 30 days for paid accounts) and whilst blocked, any further attempts to send to the recipient will be rejected and these attempts will also show as 'Rejected' events. 

How can I fix a spam complaint? 

We recommend you remove the email address from your mailing list to avoid further sending attempts as they will count towards your monthly email quota. To resolve a spam complaint if you believe it was not legitimate, you could reach out to the recipient by another means. If was by accident and they do wish to continue receiving your emails, you can remove their address from the "Reports > Suppressions" page.

Note: If you cannot find the address on your Suppressions page, please ensure you set the date/time filter to 'All Time' when searching for the specific address. The recipient will also need to move the email from their spam/junk folder and back into their inbox to avoid future emails automatically being placed there.

We do not recommend removing the recipient address from the Suppressions page due to a spam complaint without their permission. If you do unblock the email address and send to them again, this could result in another spam complaint which will draw the attention of our review team. 


If you encounter any spam complaints that you would like assistance with, please contact our award-winning support team with specific examples and we will investigate for you.