Order emails not being generated

Backlight 4, 5 & 6 Support
1

Scratching my head - my Backlight 5 has suddenly stopped generating order emails this morning. I had an order at 09:15 and received the usual Backlight order email and a paypal email - subsequent two orders at 10:00 and 10:15 haven’t generated an order email (but I’ve had the Paypal email). I’ve done a test from Backlight admin and I haven’t received the email I sent from there either. Also not getting email from the contact form. Any ideas? I’ve raised a support ticket with my hosting co to ask if they’ve changed anything this morning.

2

Can you confirm whether the messages/orders exist in Backlight’s admin?

3

Hi Matt, yes I can see the message I sent as a test in Backlight, and all the orders are listed under cart>orders. I think the order emails are going to the customers, just not to me!

4

Well, that shows Backlight is working. Delivery issues are somewhat outside the software’s realm of responsibility, unfortunately. As you’ve seen, changes by or to the host can impact deliverability, as well as shifting trust metrics well beyond what we can observe.

Increasingly, this is a problem with trying to send email from self-hosted websites.

We have some information here about configuring Backlight for best odds of successful delivery, but it’s not a guarantee: Email Settings | Backlight

If possible, I recommend setting up notifications for Backlight activity: RSS Feeds | Backlight

5

You can also just add those RSS feeds to a reader if you use one regularly enough to see them. Just make it a part of your routine,

6

Or this:

To get immediate notifications when specific RSS feeds update, you have three excellent options depending on how you prefer to receive alerts:

  • For Desktop Browser Alerts: Use Feedbro or RSS Feed Reader for Chrome/Firefox. They sit right in your browser, support custom Rules/Filters, and trigger native desktop popups when specific feeds get new items.
  • For Mobile Push & Web Alerts: Use NewsBlur or Inoreader. Both are dedicated news readers with built-in push notifications. NewsBlur features high-frequency 5-minute checking, while Inoreader uses custom rules to alert you of specific posts.
  • For Any App (Slack, Email, SMS, Discord): Use IFTTT or Zapier. You can build a workflow that says “When a specific feed updates, send a notification to my app”.