If you have set up Outlook to use Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) and also read receipts then you may have some users who will report errors or problems related to junk email.

A read receipt is a tracking mechanism that allows the sender to request a receipt indicating that the recipient has received and read their email message. The recipient has the option to acknowledge receipt and/or that the email message has also been read.

Whether or not the sender receives that receipt is not only dependent on the recipient’s acknowledgement but more so on the email server, specifically the email server’s support of read receipts. Additionally, although the email server might support sending out read receipts it may not support delivery receipts which is usually a setting configured to prevent spammers from determining mailbox addresses.

Read receipts make sense for internal communications and critical email messages. They help to establish a paper trail useful in legal matters. However some users may consider this an intrusion or a disruption in their normal business flow and may thus disable this option.

Some users have reported that when Outlook synchronizes with the email server and purges the junk email folder that read receipts will be returned. This can happen when messages that have receipt requests are being moved to the junk email folder and you then empty the junk email folder from another client. This can happen even though the settings in Tools, Options, Email Options and Tracking Options indicate otherwise.

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