Common problems
Something is wrong with your contact form
Find the symptom rather than the cause — working out the cause is what these pages are for. Most of what follows is a setting in your form builder or your DNS, and we have said so where it is.
One thing has changed since most of this advice was written: a growing share of contact form spam is drafted by a model, so it reads like a real customer. The defences that test how a form was filled in cannot see it, and the ones that tighten instead start holding back real enquiries.
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Nothing is arriving from the form
Four things can stop a contact form reaching you and only one of them is a broken form. Work through them in the order that costs you least.
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They arrive, but in the spam folder
Nearly always the form is sending as your visitor, from your server — which fails the checks Gmail and Outlook run. Fix the From address, not the wording.
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The spam reads like a real customer
It names your town, refers to your work and asks for fifteen minutes. Four things separate a machine-written approach from somebody who actually needs you.
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Spam, but a CAPTCHA is not an option
A CAPTCHA taxes every real visitor to stop some of the bots. Start with the two defences nobody has to pass, then filter what gets through by what it says.
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It started all at once, this week
Nothing on your site broke. Your form reached a list, and lists get traded. Here is what changed, what does not work, and what does.
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No fault — just not sure it all arrives
A test submission proves that a message you were expecting arrived. Here are the four questions that tell you about the ones you were not expecting.
Not sure which one it is?
The free check reads your contact page and tells you what it finds — no account, nothing installed, and nothing on your site changes.