What does the Email Invitation Statuses mean
Last updated more than 2 months ago |
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When inviting respondents to answer a Quest by Email or SMS, you may track the various invitation– and response statuses for each individual message from the Invitees list.
The Invitees list is accessed from the Distribution pane:

The Invitation status will show which respondents that have received their invitation (i.e. the invitation status spells “Delivered”) and which has not (any other status than “Delivered”):

The following table explain the various invitation statuses briefly:
Invitation status |
Description (The Email/SMS is …) |
Delivered |
… successfully sent from Essentials |
Hard bounced* |
… sent from Essentials, but returned as hard bounced |
Not invited |
… not sent from Essentials. Tip: mark the respondent and click “Invite” |
Scheduled for delivery |
… scheduled to be sent from Essentials at a specified time |
Quarantined |
… not sent from Essentials, because the invitee was invited earlier and the set
quarantine period has not been reached |
Soft bounced** |
… sent from Essentials, but returned as soft bounced |
*Hard bounced: The email has been returned to Essentials because the recipients address is invalid, (permanently undeliverable). Such hard bounces might be caused by any of the following reasons:
- the domain name does not exist
- the recipient is unknown
- the address is invalid (typos or changed address)
- the e-mail recipient’s mail server has blocked Essentials server (ex. Has received too many mails from “@questback.com”)
- there’s some type of network problem on the recipient’s end
Tips to resolve hard bounces:
- Check that the email address is spelled correctly. If not, delete the invitation and send it to the correct address
- Check if it exists using https://verify-email.org/. If not, delete the invitation and send it to an alternate address
- If many recipients from the same domain was blocked, consider contacting IT personnel responsible for the domain and have them whitelisting the following domains:
- mail1.questback.net
- mail2.questback.net
- mail3.questback.net
- mail4.questback.net
**Soft bounced: The email reaches the respondents mail server but is bounced back before reaching the respondents mailbox. Such “soft bounces” might occur because:
- the recipient’s mailbox is full (over-quota)
- the server is down or overloaded
- the message is too large
- the user has abandoned the mailbox
Soft bounced invitation commonly resolves themselves over time. Essentials will continue trying to send soft bounced invitations the 24 hours.
The Response status will show which respondents have answered (I.e. “completed” or “deleted”) or not yet completed their answer (any other status than “completed” or “deleted”):

The following table briefly explain the various response statuses:
Response status |
Description (”The Respondent has …”) |
Completed |
… completed the Quest |
Deleted |
… completed the Quest, but the response is deleted |
GDPR Opt-out |
… declined participate in the Quest from the GDPR-page |
N/A |
… not been able to answer because of hard-/soft bounced invitation |
Not Responded |
… not answered yet |
Opt-out |
… opted out of the Quest from the Email/SMS invitation |
Uncompleted |
… started answering the quest, but not completed |
(Blank response status) |
… not been invited yet, response is thus not possible |
Hidden |
Quest has Hidden Identity set, response status is hidden for all respondents |
NOTE: If Hidden Identity is enabled either “always” or “optional”, the response status “Hidden” will show for all respondents.