Random Emails Gone from Gmail

[jtnag]

One of my workflow within gmail is to use it as searchable history of conversations/receipts/confirmations emails.

While I was printing out all the confirmation for upcoming holiday, I needed to get the confirmation of car rental.

Searched in gmail search - no email confirmation returned, seemed strange as I remember that I check it in December. Checked credit card history - it was payed although payment details did not had rental company name nor reservation confirmation id. - searched gmail mails around payment time - no match. - searched browser history - found links to gmail url with confirmation id around December, gmail url does not opens the email but inbox.

With confirmation id, I went through one-by-one on rental company to finally get the voucher by confirmation id and email.

This is the second time where email was simply gone from gmail - is it me (I'm loosing the trust for myself) or more then gmail issue?

[jaggs]

Yep, I've definitely had the same weirdness in the past. Messages completely gone or hidden. I've noticed that I also get the odd email from a stranger's account every so often. Which is really worrying.

[smittywerben]

If you somehow find how to contact Google Support, I'd pass along the url with the ID. Maybe you have a rogue SMTP client putting the message into an unlabeled folder. Or your account is cursed, I like some of my gmail accounts more than others. It's hard to say. Sorry about that though. I've looked into recording all of my HTTP/HTTPS (decrypted) packets because losing important documents like this drives me crazy.

[aurizon]

It was there, but the classic . search did not find it - you found it as a response to the original booking. Hard to say if google is easing their cross-indexing?? or what? I wonder if the paid gmail has that same problem, or does the fee cover the extra detail work? I wonder if yahoo etc do the same? Or was this a one time flaw?

[jtnag]

Email was not there at all - not in searched results nor in mailbox history. Only reference was seen in firefox browser history where url to maiblox is kept + tab description (fortunately it included reservation id). Url did not resolved into showing email content.

[aurizon]

Well, I download all my gmails every year as an searchable archive. I joined in Oct 2006 = 600,000+ mails in it now.

[hiidrew]

I've noticed gmail search is poor, especially if you're trying to recover something accidentally deleted

[ipython]

I think often about this sort of “digital rot”. It’s got to be more common than we anticipate.