diff --git a/serviceHelpers/freshdesk.py b/serviceHelpers/freshdesk.py
index 8c5ca0e..02bd29a 100644
--- a/serviceHelpers/freshdesk.py
+++ b/serviceHelpers/freshdesk.py
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+import re
 import base64
 import json
 import logging
@@ -119,16 +120,22 @@ def _get_agent_by_id(self, agent_id):
         return agent_o
 
     def _get_agent_by_email(self, email):
-        """interanl method"""
+        """internal method"""
+
         if email is None or not isinstance(email, str):
-            _LO.error("invalid parameters passed to _get_agent_by_email")
+            _LO.error("invalid parameters type passed to _get_agent_by_email")
+            return FreshdeskAgent()
+        if re.match(r".*@.*..*", email) is None:
+            _LO.error("invalid email format passed to _get_agent_by_email")
             return FreshdeskAgent()
+
         email_f = quote_plus(email)
         url = f"https://{self.host}/api/v2/agents?email={email_f}"
 
         agent_j = self._request_and_validate(url)
         agent_o = FreshdeskAgent()
-        agent_o.from_dict(agent_j[0])
+        if len(agent_j) > 0:
+            agent_o.from_dict(agent_j[0])
         return agent_o
 
     def _request_and_validate(self, url, headers=None, body=None) -> dict:
diff --git a/tests/test_freshdesk.py b/tests/test_freshdesk.py
index ff0c43c..0e343a6 100644
--- a/tests/test_freshdesk.py
+++ b/tests/test_freshdesk.py
@@ -88,3 +88,11 @@ def test_user_email(caplog):
 
     for record in caplog.records:
         assert record.levelno < logging.WARNING
+
+
+def test_user_invalid_email(caplog):
+    "fetch a user by email, with invalid items. Will"
+    fresh = FreshDesk(FRESHDESK_HOST, FRESHDESK_KEY)
+    emails = ["", 5, "not-real@test.com"]
+    for email in emails:
+        agent = fresh._get_agent_by_email(email)
diff --git a/tests/test_zendesk.py b/tests/test_zendesk.py
index 2f7d4b7..eb3c792 100644
--- a/tests/test_zendesk.py
+++ b/tests/test_zendesk.py
@@ -96,7 +96,7 @@ def test_search_user(caplog):
         assert isinstance(users[user_key], ZendeskUser)
 
 
-def test_user_init(caplog):
+def test_user_init_and_invalid_handling(caplog):
     """verifies the error handling of a ZendeskUser object's initialisation"""
 
     test_strs = [