After a glitch caused unsolicited alumni mailings to appear in many Boston University students’ email boxes, the Office of Alumni Relations decided to stop using outside vendors to contact alumni by email, according to BU spokesman Colin Riley.

The Oct. 1 email went to some students’ non-BU email accounts, sometimes addressed to their parents. The email informed recipients that their email address would be provided to the university for future mailings unless they clicked an ‘opt-out’ link.

Riley said ‘a small number’ of the thousands of recipients called to complain or inquire about the email’s legitimacy. The email was sent to alumni, parents of students and ‘friends’ of BU, but was incorrectly worded, he added.

‘Since the list was not limited to alumni, the language on the email was misworded by merely saying ‘to gather the email addresses of our alumni’ since parents of students and friends of Boston University were also contacted,’ Riley said in an email.

Kellie Morey, a Sargent School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences junior, said the email she received was addressed to her father.

‘I thought it was weird, because I’d never given BU that email address,’ Morey said. Rather than opt-out, she said she simply deleted the email all together.

Kellene Isom, a College of Arts and Sciences junior who works at Alumni Relations, said their information system stores names of alumni and students’ parents in the same section.

‘We were loaded with calls … six to 10 a day,’ she said.

Recipients who called to complain or inquire about the email have each received a personalized letter of apology sent through the mail and signed by Executive Director of Alumni Relations Meg Umlas.

‘As part of our ongoing effort to improve alumni records … our office contracted with a vendor with whom we’ve worked before and asked the firm to search for alumni email addresses,’ the letter read. ‘We have since ceased the effort and apologize if you were offended or inconvenienced by it.

‘We will no longer have our vendor send email to you on our behalf which could be confused with spam or, worse, a company pretending to be Boston University,’ the letter continued.

Riley said hiring outside vendors to track of changing alumni mailing and email addresses is ‘a valid practice’ that ‘all universities’ use, and the Oct. 1 mailing was first time BU used them to find alumni email addresses.

The university provides names of alumni or other potentially interested parties, such as current students’ parents, to the vendors, who then search for their email addresses.

BU only uses vendors who keep the lists confidential and who are required to destroy the records after giving the results to the university, Riley said.

Riley said BU will continue to use vendors to keep track of mailing addresses, but not email addresses.