Troubleshooting SSL Certificate Issuance Delays

Table of Contents

• Sectigo Certificate Delays
• Let’s Encrypt Certificate Delays
• General Tips
• Have More Questions?

After ordering an SSL certificate, it moves through validation and issuance before it is ready to install. If your certificate is stuck in a “submitted” or “pending” state, one of the following issues is likely the cause.

Sectigo Certificate Delays

Email validation not completed

The most common cause of Sectigo certificate delays is that the domain validation email has not been approved. Sectigo will not issue the certificate until someone clicks the approval link in the validation email.

Check:

1. Verify you selected the correct validation email address on the certificate page in DNSimple.
2. Check the inbox (and spam/junk folder) of that email address for the validation message from Sectigo.
3. If the email was not received, see Troubleshooting Email Validation for SSL Certificates.

CAA records blocking issuance

If your domain has CAA records and Sectigo is not listed as an authorized certificate authority, Sectigo will refuse to issue the certificate even after email validation succeeds.

Fix: Add a CAA record authorizing Sectigo: example.com. CAA 0 issue "sectigo.com". For wildcard certificates, also add: example.com. CAA 0 issuewild "sectigo.com".

Extended CA review

Occasionally, Sectigo holds a certificate for additional review. This can add hours or days to the issuance process. If your certificate has been pending for more than 24 hours after email approval, contact support and we will investigate with Sectigo.

Let’s Encrypt Certificate Delays

Let’s Encrypt certificates are typically issued within 30-60 minutes. If your certificate has been pending longer, see Troubleshooting Let’s Encrypt Certificate Failures for DNS delegation, rate limit, and CAA issues.

General Tips

• Check the certificate status on the certificate detail page in your DNSimple account. The status indicates which stage the certificate is in.
• Review How Long Does It Take to Issue an SSL Certificate? for expected timelines by certificate type.
• If the certificate has been pending for an unusually long time and you have verified all the above, contact support and we will investigate.

Have More Questions?

If you have any questions about certificate issuance, contact support, and we’ll be happy to help.