Most clients seem to respect the Reply-To header, but they're not required to [1], and some popular MS ones in particular seem to ignore it, at least in some cases [2, 3].
There are a bunch of arguments for avoiding "noreply" addresses in the first place [4, 5]. We started using our customer service email as the from/reply-to for password resets and other service emails, with good results.
But that's not a good option for messages you're sending on behalf of particular users... the replies are probably intended specifically for those users. I'm running into something similar with emailed invitations from my site, and have been thinking about ways to get the replies back to the user doing the inviting.
You could try something like:
From: "John Smith via ExampleCo" <replies+encoded-user-id@example.com>
where "encoded-user-id" is a signed and timestamped identifier that lets you identify your "John Smith" user, so you can forward the reply to them (or insert it in their newsfeed in your product, or whatever makes sense). You'd have to be very careful to validate incoming replies, to avoid creating an open mail relay or a vector for spammers to reach your users. (Services that implement anonymous/private replies, like Craigslist, use an approach like this.)
Does anyone know of any well-tested packages that safely provide this sort of reply forwarding? Or transactional ESPs that offer it directly?
There are a bunch of arguments for avoiding "noreply" addresses in the first place [4, 5]. We started using our customer service email as the from/reply-to for password resets and other service emails, with good results.
But that's not a good option for messages you're sending on behalf of particular users... the replies are probably intended specifically for those users. I'm running into something similar with emailed invitations from my site, and have been thinking about ways to get the replies back to the user doing the inviting.
You could try something like:
where "encoded-user-id" is a signed and timestamped identifier that lets you identify your "John Smith" user, so you can forward the reply to them (or insert it in their newsfeed in your product, or whatever makes sense). You'd have to be very careful to validate incoming replies, to avoid creating an open mail relay or a vector for spammers to reach your users. (Services that implement anonymous/private replies, like Craigslist, use an approach like this.)Does anyone know of any well-tested packages that safely provide this sort of reply forwarding? Or transactional ESPs that offer it directly?
[1]: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/32696850/is-the-reply-to-...
[2]: https://medium.com/@BraunDoug/windows-10-mail-client-broken-...
[3]: http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=86&topicid=1949...
[4]: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/email-marketing/2011/08...
[5]: https://www.mailjet.com/blog/the-noreply-dilemma-going-from-...