Jason Hendriks

Assuming Postman is configured with cwd@cwdlaw.net as your envelope from address, then Office 365 is rejecting your email due to an SPF violation.

cwdlaw.net. 3599 IN MX 0 cwdlaw-net.mail.protection.outlook.com.
cwdlaw.net. 599 IN TXT "v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com -all"

You’ve specified outlook.com as the only approved SMTP server, but since we all know Hostgator blocks the ports to outlook.com, you are obviously violating this rule. Change your SPF record to include Hostgator.

cwdlaw.net. 599 IN TXT "v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com include:websitewelcome.com -all"

GoDaddy techs tells me that they do not show up on the Office 365 log

It’s impossible for GoDaddy techs to confirm or deny that.

Everyone is stymied as to why the emails aren’t reaching the email server.

Sure they are. Maybe you should tell the idiots to read my blog 😉

Thanks for posting a real domain name. You don’t know how hard it is to troubleshoot a problem for someone who’s example.com email is not working ;P

See WordPress emails are sent but not received

nothing fixes the issue EXCEPT configuring the SMTP so that a valid email address, username, password & mail servers are specified.

Well that’s great! So you found a solution.

I am reluctant to go down this path

Them’s the breaks, I guess.

I downloaded Postman 1.7 but it needs PHP 5.4 and I only have 5.3.29 installed unfortunately.

Ah dammit. Really? It must be the SendGrid API. They’re using namespaces. I’ll see if I can fix it.

SpamAssassin as cpaneleximscanner detected
OUTGOING not smtp message as spam (6.2)

So there’s your issue. Exim thinks you are spam.

I know you said you know all about best practices and you did everything right, but are you 100% sure this domain’s SPF record matches your mail servers IP address? You haven’t posted the domain so I can not check for you.

That, plus not authenticating, would be enough to trip SpamAssassin. It also seems to care that you didn’t use SMTP.

If you have access to cPanel, enable the Remote Mail Exchanger option.

Make sure you have an SPF record on the domain authorizing go daddy’s SMTP server to send mail.

See http://www.codingmonkey.ca/my-contact-form-emails-are-not-being-sent-to-yahoo-hotmail-gmail/

Exactly which fields are you changing in the CF7 Mail tab?

When I hit the SUBMIT button after pretending to be a visitor -Contact7 displays an error at the bottom of the form that has a RED outline;

Which is why I gave the advice i did. And why I sent you to this link : I GET AN ERROR MESSAGE WITH A RED BORDER. SO, HOW CAN I SOLVE THIS?

I have installed postman SMTP but there is NO log entry generated when the form is filled in […] I have not configured postman SMTP though.

V1.6 of the plugin does not capture emails when it is not configured. So of course the log is empty. If you’re dead-set against configuring it, download the version 1.7 beta which will capture the SMTP error without requiring you to configure it.

For some reason Contact7 does not even attempt to send a form

That’s very unlikely, given that CF7 is reporting the results of sending the mail to you.

It really should work without installing another plugin

Perhaps. Yet, in this case, a necessary evil?

I understand your frustration and I believe this is your only troubleshooting option, unless you are capable of examining the SMTP server logs on your VPS and determining the error on your own.

Do you know that WordPress updated PHPMailer in the latest release (4.3)? Perhaps this is the cause of your problems.

https://wordpress.org/support/topic/emails-no-longer-work?replies=18#post-7613751

Could you set your contact form to send a message to the visitor.. Add the visitor email as a cc header or something. I’d like to inspect the email myself. There’s got to be something different between the email my form sent and the email your form sent.

I live in Montreal, btw!