Peter Prinsen, general counsel of The Graham Co., an insurance brokerage firm, recently learned that knowing whether a recipient received an e-mail can be more important than the content of the e-mail itself.

The brokerage routinely receives information about a claim from the client and then reports that claim to the insurance carrier via e-mail. Normally this is a smooth process. But the company hit a snag several months ago when one of the carriers said it hadn’t received a $60,000 claim.