Okay this is really is a reseller-related question.

Basically I am asking, is there a potential "gotcha" with email forwarding?

Let's say I resell to a client who wants several email forwards set up.
Sure that is simple to set up. But what if there are many emails being forwarded that have large attachments? Won't these large attachments use a lot of network capacity and count against the net traffic allocation? (I am not asking about restricting/limiting attachment sizes)

Obviously I am not really sure what happens when an email with a large attachment is sent out. Does the origination mail server first query the receiving email server with a "hey buddy, is this one of your accounts and can you take one this big? Okay, here it comes!"

Or is it a "blind" process where the entire message, with attachment, is sent out and then is either routed to mailbox or forward address or "returned to sender, no such number, no such zone." (Sorry Elvis) In this case, an email with say a 100 meg attachment would use 100 meg traffic coming in and then another 100 meg outbound to the forwarding address for 200 meg total right?

Thanks for any clarification!

BB

Usually in a forwarded email situation the sender uses their ISP to send the email. Most ISPs have restrictions on the attachment size, 5 megs being the limit for most.

Usually attachments of that size (100mb in your example) will be denied by the ISPs e-mail server. As a web host, I have never had that type of issue with offering e-mail forwarders.