Changes to our sending review process

We’re changing some of the language we use in our sending review process to make our communications clearer and more helpful.

If you’re not familiar with the sending review process, it refers to the actions that we take when there are issues with the email sent from an Amazon SES or Amazon Pinpoint account. Usually, these issues are a result of senders making honest mistakes. However, when email providers receive problematic email from a sender, they can’t tell if the sender made a mistake, or if they’re doing something malicious. If an email provider detects a problem that’s severe enough, they might block all incoming email from the sender’s IP address. If that happens, email sent from other senders who use the same IP address is blocked as well.

For this reason, we look for certain patterns and behaviors that could cause deliverability problems, and then work with our customers to help resolve the issues with the email sent from their accounts. We used to call this our enforcement process, but we now refer to it as our sending review process. This name is a much better description of the process (not to mention a bit friendlier).

You might notice some other changes as well. When the reputation metrics for an account (such as the account’s bounce or complaint rate) exceed certain levels, or another issue occurs that could impact the reputation of that account, we’ll monitor the email sending behaviors of that account for a certain period of time. During this time, we make a note of whether the problem gets better or worse. Previously, this period was called a probation period; we now call it a review period.

If an account is under review, but the sender isn’t able to correct the issue before the end of the review period, we’ll temporarily disable the account’s ability to send any more email. We take this action to protect the reputation of the sender, and to ensure that other customers can send email without experiencing deliverability issues. We used to call this a suspension, but that name seemed very permanent and punitive. We now refer to these events as sending pauses, because in the majority of cases, they’re temporary and reversible.

Finally, if a sender disagrees with our decision to place a review period or sending pause on their account, they can contact us to let us know why we made this decision in error. This used to be known as an appeal, but we now call it a review.

If we ever change the status of your account, such as by implementing a review period or sending pause, we’ll contact you by email at the address associated with your AWS account. We recommend that you make sure that we have the right email address. For information about changing the email address associated with your AWS account, see Managing an AWS Account in the AWS Billing and Cost Management User Guide.

In addition to sending you a notification by email, we’ll also update the reputation dashboard in the Amazon SES console to show the current status of your account. To learn more about the reputation dashboard, see Using the Reputation Dashboard in the Amazon SES Developer Guide.