Email Forwarding

How forwarding works

When you set up a channel in There There, you give it an email address like support@yourcompany.com. That address lives with your existing email provider (Gmail, Outlook, etc.) and you keep full control of it.

Forwarding tells your provider to send a copy of every incoming message to There There. Your original mailbox keeps working as before. You still benefit from your provider's spam filtering, archiving, and search. The only difference is that a copy also arrives in There There, where it becomes a ticket your team can pick up.

Think of it like mail forwarding when you move house: the post office sends a copy to your new address, but the old one still works.

Setting up forwarding

Gmail / Google Workspace

1. Open Gmail and click the gear icon, then See all settings.
2. Go to the Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab.
3. Click Add a forwarding address and paste the There There inbound address shown in your channel setup.
4. Google will send a confirmation email to the forwarding address. This email will appear as a ticket in There There once forwarding is active. You may also find the confirmation in your Gmail inbox or spam folder. Click the confirmation link.
5. Back in Gmail settings, select Forward a copy of incoming mail to and choose the There There address from the dropdown.
6. Set the second dropdown to keep Gmail's copy in the Inbox.
7. Click Save Changes at the bottom of the page.

Why keep a copy in Gmail? Gmail's spam filter runs before forwarding. Spam gets caught in Gmail and never reaches There There. Legitimate emails get forwarded and become tickets. This gives you the best of both worlds.

Google Workspace admins: If you manage forwarding for a shared mailbox (like support@), you can also configure forwarding in the Google Admin Console under Apps > Google Workspace > Gmail > Routing. This is useful when you need to forward from a group address or apply forwarding org-wide.

Outlook / Microsoft 365

1. Sign in to Outlook on the web.
2. Click the gear icon and go to Mail > Forwarding.
3. Check Enable forwarding.
4. Paste the There There inbound address.
5. Keep Keep a copy of forwarded messages checked.
6. Click Save.

Microsoft 365 admin restrictions: Some organizations disable external forwarding by default. If you don't see the forwarding option, or if forwarding silently stops working, your IT admin may need to allow external forwarding for this specific mailbox. They can do this in the Exchange admin center under Mail flow > Remote domains or by creating a transport rule.

Yahoo Mail

1. Click the gear icon and go to More settings > Mailboxes.
2. Select your mailbox and scroll down to Forwarding.
3. Click the toggle to enable forwarding.
4. Enter the There There inbound address and click Save.

cPanel / Webmail (Hostgator, Bluehost, GoDaddy, etc.)

1. Log in to your hosting control panel (cPanel).
2. Under the Email section, click Forwarders.
3. Click Add Forwarder.
4. Enter the email address you want to forward (the local part before the @).
5. Select Forward to Email Address and paste the There There inbound address.
6. Click Add Forwarder.

Other providers

The exact steps vary, but the process is always the same:

1. Find the forwarding or mail rules settings in your email provider.
2. Add the There There inbound address as the forwarding destination.
3. If your provider asks you to verify the forwarding address, look for a confirmation email and click the link.
4. Make sure a copy of each message stays in your original inbox.

If your provider uses the term "mail rules" or "filters" instead of "forwarding", create a rule that matches all incoming mail and forwards it to the There There address.

Verifying forwarding

After setting up forwarding, send a test email to your channel's email address (e.g. support@yourcompany.com) from a different account. There There checks for incoming messages automatically. Once the first forwarded email arrives, the channel setup page will confirm that forwarding is working.

If the verification doesn't complete:

• Check your spam folder. Some providers (especially Gmail) send a confirmation email that may land in spam.
• Wait a few minutes. Forwarding can take a minute or two to activate, especially with Google Workspace.
• Verify the forwarding address is correct. Copy it again from the channel setup page and double-check it in your provider's settings.
• Check your provider's admin policies. Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace organizations sometimes block external forwarding at the admin level.

Common questions

Will I lose access to my existing mailbox?

No. Forwarding sends a copy. Your original mailbox continues to receive and store emails as before.

Should I reply from There There or from my email provider?

Reply from There There. If you reply from Gmail or Outlook directly, There There won't know about it, and the conversation will be split across two places.

Can I forward from a shared mailbox or Google Group?

Shared mailboxes work well. Google Groups can be trickier because they sometimes modify email headers. If you use a Google Group, set up forwarding at the individual mailbox level rather than the group level.

What about spam?

Your email provider's spam filter runs before forwarding. Emails caught as spam are not forwarded. This is a feature, not a bug. It means There There only receives legitimate messages.

Can I stop forwarding later?

Yes. Disable forwarding in your email provider at any time. Existing tickets in There There are not affected.