Need a webhost with reliable email and good spam blocking -- Any suggestions?

Help! I run a small publishing company. We've had our website on
ipowerweb.com for over a year and were reasonably happy.

In the last 6 months, however, my email account has been bombarded
with spam and in the last few weeks the email service has become
extremely unreliable.

This is the second time in two weeks I've had to complain to them
about not receiving my email. (The last time, they informed me that
45,000 emails were stuck on one Windows server serving me and hundreds
of other customers. It took 4 days and 4 or 5 calls to tech support to
correct, each with the requisite 30-minute wait on hold.)

On top of that, I don't understand why Yahoo can block all my spam but
a supposedly "professional" web host can't -- or won't.

I'm ready to quit and move to a new provider but would like some
suggestions. We do a little e-commerce via our website but don't
generate a lot of traffic as of now. So I need a low-cost provider
with decent customer support and reliable spam-free email.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Rich Heidorn
InterMedia Publishing, LLC.

I use Bluehost for shared hosting. The support is excellent IMHO.

I don't know of any host with 'reliable spam free email' but most have some sort of spam filters in place like Spam Assassin and you'll have to configure them yourself. There are programs in place on some hosts (Bluehost included) that have spam options that require senders to 'prove' that they are legit by filling out a brief form before their mail can be sent. Once this is done the sender is considered legit.

The best way to protect yourself against spam is to be very careful about where you post your email address and if you have to post it, encrypt the address so bots cannot harvest it.

One thing that can dramatically lower your junk mail is to stop receiving your domain's catch all. Instead set up your account to only receive legitimate email addresses that you use and send everything else in to your Web site's black hole.

This helped one of my sites to lower their junk mail from a couple thousand a day to a something in the low hundred. Once the volume of junk mail was lowered the spam filter started working better and picked up all the junk mail from the legitimate email.

We used Hostway prior to us getting our own servers. We were very pleased with their spam and virus controls

I would not blame the hosting company for your spam. There is a can of worms we could open regarding spam and cutting down on it requires user interaction. For one thing you should have some sort of personal firewall to help with this. I use Norton Internet Security and have been very happy with it.

Is your Website data driven? That will have a say in your desired hosting. As far as hosting, you get what you pay for. I always encourage people to spend a little more on hosting. The cheaper a hosting company is the busier they are, and thus the more problems.

Without knowing the nature of your Website it is hard to recommend anyone. However, these hosts have all been good for us over the years.
www.securewebs.com
www.orcsweb.com


I just moved a client here for dedicated hosting and they have also been very good. Again, one client is all I have there but their tech support has been great and no problems other than minor nuiances in getting everything moved over there.
www.hostmysite.com

Do you have the options of a cpanel? if so click on mail and click on filters and add filters to filter out the spam. I provide hosting if your really needing a better solution