I noticed that my email service (via Gmail) has been running slower than usual this afternoon. I was expecting to receive a couple of important emails, and both seemed to have been delayed. I visited Google’s G Suite Status Dashboard, and it indicates there is currently a Service Disruption impacting Gmail service, although none of Google’s other services indicate a service disruption or service outage at this time:
I have not yet received the emails I was expecting to receive, but I have been seeing an email delay with my Gmail account for other emails that are coming through.
One email I received was from GoDaddy Auctions informing me I was outbid on an auction. The email arrived in my inbox at 2:23, but the timestamp within Gmail said 1:14pm. The auction ended by the time I clicked through to check on the status of the auction.
This might go without saying, but you should not rely on emails to know if you have been outbid on an auction. There can be email delays or other email deliverability issues that cause you to miss an important email like an outbid notice.
Gmail is not the only email service to have these types of delays, I have found it with Microsoft Office, Gmail, AOL (from many years ago) I have even tried to reduce the delay by having my own servers with dedicated IP address, it didn’t help.