5 reasons your website’s contact form stopped working (and a 2-minute way to check)

Your website can look perfectly fine while its contact form quietly stops working. Customers fill it in, press Send, and their request never reaches you. Nobody gets an error message, and most owners only notice when the phone goes quiet.

In October 2026 we checked the contact pages of 250 plumbing, HVAC, roofing and electrical companies in six US cities. Most worked that day, but 9 had a problem that could stop customer requests from reaching the business. Here are the most common reasons forms break.

1. A plugin or theme update

Most small-business websites run on WordPress, Wix or Squarespace, and they update themselves. An update to the form plugin, the theme or another plugin can change how the form works. The page still loads, but the Send button may do nothing.

2. The spam filter is set up wrong

Many forms use Google reCAPTCHA to block spam. It needs a “site key” that matches your website. If the key is wrong or expired, real customers can be treated as spam and their messages thrown away. We found exactly this on one of the sites we checked.

3. The email settings changed

Your form sends its messages to an email address. If that address changed, the inbox is full, or the messages are landing in spam, the form looks like it worked but you never see the request. Changing email provider is a common cause.

4. A booking or chat tool stopped loading

“Book online” buttons and chat bubbles are often provided by another company and loaded onto your page. If that connection breaks, the button stays on the page but does nothing when customers click it. Several of the sites we checked had booking and chat tools that failed to load.

5. The page moved or the site went down

A website redesign can move or rename the contact page, leaving old links pointing at a “page not found” error. Sometimes the whole site shows an error for a while after a hosting problem. Two of the sites we checked showed an error page instead of their website.

How to check your own form in 2 minutes

1. Open your website on your phone, the way a customer would.
2. Go to your contact or quote page and fill in the form with your own details, writing “TEST” in the message.
3. Press Send and check you see a thank-you message.
4. Check your inbox, including the spam folder, within a few minutes.
5. Try the “Book online” button and chat bubble too, if you have them.

If everything arrives, great. The catch is that a form that works today can break after the next update, and nobody will tell you when it does.

Want us to check it for you?

We’ll check your website’s forms for free and email you a plain-English report with screenshots. If you’d like, we can keep testing them on a schedule and email you the day something breaks.