subdomain delegation for email routing

Thu Sep 25 18:43:34 PDT 2003

hi ya alan

On Thu, 25 Sep 2003, Alan Factor wrote:

> I have a client (company1.com) who has customers send email to several
> special email accounts (such as customer service which goes to
> care at company1.com). These emails are processed along with all other
> corporate email by the corporate mail server and then forwarded to an
> outside vendor (webservice.com) that handles these special email
> accounts.
> A backup copy is made and kept by company1.com and the original is
> forwarded to the vendor (e.g., to company1-cs at webvendor.com) and the
> vendor
> responds to the email. Unfortunately average response times are 48
> hours.  
> 
> My client wants to have the customer service email delivered directly to
> the outside vendor and I suggested that they create a subdomain
> care.company1.com and delegate this subdomain to the vendor:   
> 
> care.company1.com IN  NS  ns.webservice.com
> care.company1.com IN  MX  mail.webservice.com
> 
> The vendor can forward email from care.company1.com to the appropriate
> end user and then forward a backup copy to company1 (e.g., backup.company1.com)
>  
> Is this possible?
> What DNS config is required?
> Are there any pitfalls/better ways?
> 

dozen ways to skin the cat

having the  email sent directly to the webservice/tech support
provider will not reduce/change their 48hr response time
and depending on how you did it, you might not get a copy
of it either ..

best way to do this ... on your side ...
	vi /etc/mail/aliases

	#
	# keep a copy for yourself ... and end a copy to them
	#
	care:		localcopy,customer1 at webservice.com

-- on their side
	vi /etc/mail/aliases
	#
	# they receive incoming tech support email requests
	# and send off a reply .. noting the original email info
	#
	customer1:	themself,replied at company1.com

they reply to customer1 and you also get a cc of their reply
at replied at company1.com  that its been processed

and hopefully, your contract calls for payment for 
correct and timely answers sent to "replied at company1.com" 

imho, tech support and other support services should be internal vs
outsourced

c ya
alvin