Having trouble sending an e-mail from USA to France, it keeps coming back undeliverable?

Question

We met a family from France at a National Park here in California and they quickly jotted down their e-mail address in France. There seems to be a symbol above the "a" in the address, how can I duplicate this symbol?

Answer 1

If you're running Windows:

Go to Start | All Programs | Accessories | System Tools. Select Character Map. Find the appropriate character and select it, click copy, then paste it in the To: field.

Answer 2

Copy and Paste:

á

or you can configure it yourself:

ALT 164= ñ

ALT 160= á

ALT 386= é

ALT 161= í

ALT 162 =ó

ALT 163= ú

Answer 3

I doubt their e-mail address contains any accents (what you call the symbol over the "a") as these characters are not accepted in e-mail addresses. Type it without any accent.

If it doesn't work it means there is another error like a space or _ instead of - (or vice-versa) or maybe it is a period or just poor handwriting. Also French and American handwritings are so different that they can lead to confusions, such as between digits 4 and 6 for instance. It has nothing to do with the accent over the a. But here are the only two possible accents in French over "a" if you want to try anyway (copy and paste):

à

â

(á does not exist in French)

You need to show the handwritten e-mail address to a native speaker. If you want, you can scan it or take a picture of it and e-mail it to me via my profile so I can try and figure it out.