Shared email/distribution inbox no longer possible in v20?

[redphone]

Howdy folks, it appears to me , and apologies if mistaken, that for V20 across a 3cx instance email addresses for users must be unique. Anyone else have customers sharing inboxes or distribution emails for generic purposes? sales@ info@ support@ and the like? Any thoughts? thank you.

 

[SweetAction]

3CX has stated it must be unique addresses going forward

 

[redphone]

Yes, thank you I was aware of that, I am interested to know how are you going to handle que's and ring groups with distribution emails? it is quite common with business groups. Should i be advocating for them to pay more for 365 license's for each user ? yes change is difficult , I understand , any known work around's?

 

[SteveITS]

In 365 a distribution list is free, as are shared mailboxes.

For one user, 365 has "plus addressing" where email+anytext@domain works and a unique email address can essentially be created on the fly. A growing number of spam filters can account for this. So, [email protected] could work.

 

[garrick.cobcroft@gsconsul]

That could assist in a 365 environment, but I've hit the same issue in a non 365 environment. In my case, all users login to one (let's call it POP3 for simplicity of the description) mailbox. I've gotten around the registration/login issues by having the staff members use their personal email addresses, but this still causes an issue, as the intention is for the VM messages to go to the Shared Mailbox.

 

[SteveITS]

On POP/IMAP/etc. one would have to manually create aliases on the email server, which is a mild annoyance in comparison, but can be done. The beauty of plus addressing is there is nothing to do except use them.

Gmail has plus addressing as well, and also they ignore periods I believe. (I.n.f.o@)

 

[N_G]

Yes, thank you I was aware of that, I am interested to know how are you going to handle que's and ring groups with distribution emails? it is quite common with business groups. Should i be advocating for them to pay more for 365 license's for each user ? yes change is difficult , I understand , any known work around's?

I dont see the issue as a queue or a ring group can send the notifications to all members of the queue or ring group. There is no need for distribution lists...

 

[SteveITS]

all extensions now must have a unique email address

As I recall, in v20, an extension without an email address can't log in to the web client. So theoretically it can be used that way for a kitchen phone or something. Starting last summer sometime, in v18, password reset emails are not sent unless the email address is unique.

So using my suggestion you could use andy+101@domain, andy+102@domain, etc. without having to do anything on the 365/Gmail server end.

a queue or a ring group can send the notifications to all members of the queue or ring group

It does but a (free) shared mailbox provides a common place to easily see if someone else has handled the voicemail (marked the email read).

 

[redphone]

I am guessing a security concern was raised over shared or repeated email use, just guessing really. I can say that shared single use email address in my area are used heavily for fax to email, health care/ immunization school nurse etc. the email is usually fax@.... It is how department heads can tell if an issue has been read , albeit not by who, but the email does go from unread to read. It looks like i will be creating lots of fake email address that will bounce back from now on. I am still pausing on upgrading any client to V20. When I see that is available for download in the portal- https://portal.3cx.com/partner/downloads I will start the process of creating all these fake email address for all these users to prepare. Lots of info@ contact@. emails repeated everywhere. Will this apply to emergency 911 notification? lots or non unique email address in play there. I believe Nick mentioned they were improving the 911 compliance section in V20 - I Look forward to seeing it when it is ready. It is no small task to jump from Debian 10 to 12. i would like to acknowledge all the folks working in the trenches on this , many thanks

 

[VoIPTools]

You do not want one person resetting the password for multiple users. That is why every extension must have their own email address. Otherwise multiple people would receive the password reset email and you could end up with conflict not knowing which new password won.

To Nick's point, you can use the group email features to email multiple people at the same time. Giving everyone a unique email should not be a problem. However, this does have the potential of multiple people chasing the same voicemail. There is not a built-in solution for that particular challenge. We took a slightly different approach.

In our 3CX Voicemail Manager you designate a dummy extension as the shared voicemail box. In our tool you associate multiple extensions to this voicemail box. We monitor this voicemail box and when a new voicemail is received (or heard) we send email notifications to everyone in the group. What we do differently is we also duplicate that voicemail to everyone in the group so their MWI turns on. When anyone in the group listens to the voicemail, then we update everyone else to turn off their MWI. That way, everyone knows when a voicemail has been heard and you do not have multiple people chasing the same voicemail.

I will also point out that because we are using a dummy extension as the shared voicemail box, you have all the usual options for saving greetings. And there is also voicemail archival, and separate retention policies, and optional manager access to group member voicemails, and a lot more.

 

[VoIPTools]

I welcome an open discussion of this topic. We are all here to learn as well as share our experience with others. So, I genuinely want to understand what you are proposing because I do not currently understand.

You said "It would be very easy to do a lookup of what email address is associated with the extension". I thought we were talking about multiple extensions sharing the same email address. So looking for an extension with a matching email is going to return multiple extensions, right?

If we were able to specify which extension to update, the password reset email is still going to be seen by multiple people (multiple people monitoring the same email box). How do we ensure that the password reset is invoked by the person that owns the extension? Any of the people monitoring the email box could reset your password even if the email says this is a reset for extension X.

This sounds pretty messy to me, and apparently sounded pretty messy to 3CX. What am I missing?

 

[SteveITS]

So looking for an extension with a matching email is going to return multiple extensions, right?

I think the distinction is, is a password reset "for extension 102" or is the password reset "for [email protected]"?

I suspect 3CX is looking at it from the direction of having extension logins be via email address, for example 365 SSO. Can't really log in that way if two users have the same email address. Unless you were willing to say [email protected] has multiple valid passwords and you figure out what extension it is by what password is used. And then for which are you resetting it...?

(insert vague reference to Microsoft personal vs work-or-school accounts)

 

[NovacomExperts]

@SteveITS's solution is elegant and does the job.

We see multiple same email being used when shared phone are being used, like a squid in multiple conference room. They usually are managed by the IT dept.

Another use case would be departed employee's phone. I used to put [email protected] there, just to catch anything. Since many desks could be in that situation @SteveITS fix is great.

From now on, we'll be using email+[email protected] to get rid of duplicates. Thanks for sharing.