ActionMailer rendering view not sending mail - ruby-on-rails

Question

I am having a weird issue with ActionMailer. It is sending some mails but not others. We recently upgraded to 3.2.12 and that is when the trouble started.
Here is my config:
# Disable delivery errors, bad email addresses will be ignored
config.action_mailer.raise_delivery_errors = true
# config.action_mailer.perform_deliveries = false
config.action_mailer.default_url_options = { :host => "ruby.ourdomain.com/app" }
config.action_mailer.asset_host = "http://ruby.ourdomain.com/app"
config.action_mailer.delivery_method = :smtp
config.action_mailer.smtp_settings = {
:address => "pop.ourdomain.com"
}
This mailer WORKS:
in the model:
def alertStudent
AbsenceMailer.StudentAbsenceAlert(self).deliver
end
the mailer:
def StudentAbsenceAlert(alert)
#alert = alert
#student = studentInfo(#alert.student_id)
#advisor = staffInfo(#alert.advisor)
#instructor = #alert.polling.instructor
studentAddr = #student['STUDENT_EMAIL']
mail to: studentAddr, cc: #advisor['STAFF_EMAIL'], from: #advisor['STAFF_EMAIL'], subject: "[#{#alert.polling.course}] You have been marked absent #{Time.now.strftime('%m-%e-%Y')}"
end
This mailer DOES NOT WORK and raises NO ERRORS:
the model:
def self.advisorDigest
AbsenceAlert.current_status('active').advisor_day.group_by{|r| r.advisor }.each do |id, alerts|
AbsenceMailer.AdvisorAbsenceDigest(id, alerts).deliver
end
end
the mailer:
def AdvisorAbsenceDigest(id, alerts)
#alerts = alerts
#staff = staffInfo(id)
mail to: #staff['STAFF_EMAIL'], subject: "Student Absence Report #{Time.now.strftime('%m-%e-%Y')}"
puts "[#{Time.now.strftime('%c')}] Sent Advisor Digest: #{alerts.count} alerts to #{#staff['STAFF_EMAIL']}"
end
In the log I see the following
Rendered absence_mailer/AdvisorAbsenceDigest.html.haml within layouts/app (31.6ms)
however it does not actually send the mail.
For a successful call I usually see
Sent mail to email#ourdomain.com (193ms)
immediately following the view render, and I am not getting that in the case where I am seeing a failure.
I have enabled delivery errors, and receive no errors. Our app has not changed, our config has not changed. The only thing we did was upgrade to rails 3.2.12 and the second mailer has begun to fail.

Answer 1

Still unsure why one was working and another wasn't, but I was able to rectify the issue by moving .deliver out of the model and into the mailer itself, such as this:
the model:
def self.advisorDigest
AbsenceAlert.current_status('active').advisor_day.group_by{|r| r.advisor }.each do |id, alerts|
AbsenceMailer.AdvisorAbsenceDigest(id, alerts)
end
end
the mailer:
def AdvisorAbsenceDigest(id, alerts)
#alerts = alerts
#staff = staffInfo(id)
mail(to: #staff['STAFF_EMAIL'], subject: "Student Absence Report #{Time.now.strftime('%m-%e-%Y')}").deliver
puts "[#{Time.now.strftime('%c')}] Sent Advisor Digest: #{alerts.count} alerts to #{#staff['STAFF_EMAIL']}"
end