Email sending limits and privileges

Administrators can request privileges for users who need to send large numbers of emails.

The number of emails that users can send is restricted by default to prevent the unregulated sending of large numbers of emails. If an email account is hacked, it can be used to send large amounts of spam, damaging your organization's reputation. Your organization could be blocked or otherwise constrained by external internet organizations.

When an account reaches its sending limit, it's blocked until its average sending rate drops below the limit. While it's blocked, attempts to send further emails fail, and sent emails return an error. These measures are applied to the affected account, not the whole organization. This prevents interruption to the whole organization.

Where there's a genuine need for users to send large numbers of emails, you can ask Sophos to give bulk email sender privileges to a user.

Bulk email sending limits

Standard users and users with bulk email privileges have different sending limits. For more information, see Rate limit.

You can only give bulk email sender privileges to a maximum of 5% of your organization's users.

Applying for bulk sender privileges

In My Products > Email Protection > Mailboxes, select a user and click Request bulk sender privileges. If bulk sender privileges have already been asked for or granted to that user, a status message appears.

In the Bulk email sender privileges dialog box, complete all required fields:

• How often bulk emails are sent?: Select how frequently the mailbox sends bulk emails using the following options:

  • Daily: For mailboxes that send bulk messages every day. For example, newsletters or alerts.
  • Weekly: For mailboxes that send bulk messages once or a few times a week. For example, weekly reports.
  • Monthly: For mailboxes that send bulk messages occasionally. For example, monthly statements or announcements.

• How many emails are sent per period?: Enter the approximate number of emails sent during the selected period.

  The period refers to the selected frequency.

• What is the purpose of sending emails in bulk? (eg, invoices to clients): Describe the reason for sending emails in bulk.

After you fill out the form, click Save. Sophos reviews the request within six hours.

You can also remove bulk sender privileges at any time without requiring a review.

Monitoring bulk sending privileges

Mailboxes have a Bulk email sender privileges section in My Products > Email Protection > Mailboxes. This shows the status of a privilege application.

In Alerts, you can see users who have reached their email sending limits. You can also change the frequency of alerts for a user.