What a contact can receive

A contact’s page in Contacts says what they can receive, and why. “One line per newsletter or type. Only a basis you declare, or the person themselves, gives one.”

Tags, categories, saved lists and messages from your website’s contact form never give a permission.

Can receive

Under “Can receive”, each line names a newsletter or a type, with its basis, who declared it (or the file) and the date. “They asked to leave” is beside each line.

Someone who subscribed on your website reads, for example, The Monthly · “subscribed on Café Lumen, confirmed 18 October 2026”. “How they subscribed” opens its proof.

A contact with no permission reads “Can receive nothing.”

Cannot receive

“Cannot receive” lists the rest, each with why:

• what they left, with the date;
• what an address that does not exist, or a complaint, stops;
• what has no permission yet, with “Add”.

The bases

Basis	What it means	“How and when they gave it”
“Consent in a previous tool”	“They agreed in the tool you used before.”	Needed
“Member”	“They belong to your organisation.”	Optional
“Client or supplier”	“They bought from you or work with you.”	Optional
“Consent given elsewhere”	“They agreed in another way, on paper or in person.”	Needed
“Confirmed subscription”	“They subscribed and confirmed it by email.”	Never declared or imported

“Confirmed subscription” is never given by hand or by an import. Only the sign-up form on your website gives it, once the person confirms by email.

Each type accepts only some bases. Read Types of email.

The proof

Each permission keeps its proof while it exists:

• who declared it, and when, with the tick, for example “I declare that I have permission to write to this person for Notices.”;
• how and when they gave it, as your team wrote it;
• for an import, the file’s name;
• for an import, when they opted in and confirmed, if the file says so;
• for the sign-up form, when they signed up, from which page and IP address, the words they agreed to with their version, and when and from which address they confirmed.

Add a contact to a newsletter or type

1. Open the contact’s page.
2. Under “Can receive”, press “Add to a newsletter or type”, and choose it. Or, under “Cannot receive”, press “Add” on its line.
3. Choose the “Basis”.
4. Fill in “How and when they gave it”, for example: “they signed up on paper at the 2025 fair”.
5. Tick the line that names the newsletter or type, for example “I declare that I have permission to write to this person for Notices.” It is required.
6. Press “Add”.

“Choose why you may write to them. It is kept as the proof of this permission.” It needs the level “Edit and send”.

When someone asks to leave

When a person asks you to stop writing to them, record it on their page:

• One newsletter or type. Under “Can receive”, press “They asked to leave” beside it.
• Everything. Press “They asked to leave everything”.

You can note “How they asked (optional)”.

After leaving everything: “They will not receive newsletters or commercial emails from this account again, and no import can add them back. Service emails, such as Notices, still reach them.”

From then on, no import adds them back to what they left, and declaring a basis for it again is refused, with the reason and the date.

This works even while Email is paused. Nothing is ever sent to ask them if they want to stay.

Never written to again

Some addresses are kept only so that they are never written to. A contact’s page shows them under “Never written to again”, with what is stopped:

• “Every email”: nothing reaches the address at all.
• “Every newsletter and commercial type”: service types, such as Notices, still reach it.
• One newsletter or type.

And the reason:

• “they left it”;
• “they left everything”;
• “the address does not exist”;
• “they marked it as spam”;
• “they unsubscribed in the previous tool”;
• “the previous tool removed the address”;
• “it was deleted”: the contact was deleted with “Never write to this address again” ticked. An address deleted this way cannot be added again by hand.

These addresses are not counted as contacts. They stay after a contact is deleted, and they are in your export. Read Export your contacts.