Are there email problems?

cavillas · Jul 21, 2008, 09:44:04

Are there any email problems today on idnet.com addressess? I cannot receive pop mail at the moment or webmail or am I jumping the gun?

alan · Jul 21, 2008, 09:46:29

I cannot get anything either on POP3.. I thought it was my settings for one minute.

Arathorn · Jul 21, 2008, 09:48:00

Same here. timing out on Pop3 and webmail

Arathorn

dennyjim · Jul 21, 2008, 09:49:35

sending but not receiving

David · Jul 21, 2008, 09:49:41

No Email this end either can any light be shed please wont sign in times out first and its driving me crazy.

gingergalore · Jul 21, 2008, 09:49:59

Mine's down too

Simon · Jul 21, 2008, 09:50:59

Email was down for me too, but one's just come in, so I think it may have been a temporary blip.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 09:52:01

I'm trying to find out atm.

Arathorn · Jul 21, 2008, 09:53:49

Seems OK now. must have been just a temporary hic up.

Arathorn

Simon · Jul 21, 2008, 09:55:43

All seems OK now.

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 09:57:41

Prior to this, I lost all the tbb servers for a few minutes, maybe BT are messing about?

David · Jul 21, 2008, 10:02:49

Mine is OK now panic over

cavillas · Jul 21, 2008, 10:03:47

Everything back to the exceptional norm we have come to expect, panic now over.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 10:04:19

UPDATE

The mail server now backs up every six hours. If a lot of people hit POP/IMAP at that time, timeouts may occur. It seems like this happened today.

cavillas · Jul 21, 2008, 10:04:46

Hello badpianoplayer, thought you had deserted us.

cavillas · Jul 21, 2008, 10:05:55

Quote from: Rik on Jul 21, 2008, 10:04:19
UPDATE

The mail server now backs up every six hours. If a lot of people hit POP/IMAP at that time, timeouts may occur. It seems like this happened today.

Has it been christened yet, what's its name? How about Steady Eddie.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 10:09:53

It's Clunker for the time being, Alf.

Ardua · Jul 21, 2008, 10:34:47

My e-mail continues to time out on 'receive' . If this is something that we now have to live with, then it would be nice if IDNet briefed their customers.

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 10:36:17

Yup, it's down again here.

Simon · Jul 21, 2008, 10:40:46

I noticed this on one occasion yesterday too.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 10:44:19

Quote from: Ardua on Jul 21, 2008, 10:34:47
My e-mail continues to time out on 'receive' . If this is something that we now have to live with, then it would be nice if IDNet briefed their customers.

They are going to make some adjustments following the number of reports this morning.

seagrass · Jul 21, 2008, 10:46:38

Some of the server load this morning might be self-inflicted. I notice that webmail is checking for new messages every 23 seconds!

Perhaps a button labelled "Check mail" might suffice for expectant email recipients, and cut down on all that needless traffic...

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 10:51:17

Welcome to the forum.

I'll mention that to them.

Ardua · Jul 21, 2008, 10:52:56

My point is that there is little point in IDNet reporting e-mail 'Good Service' when there are obviously reports of problems. Even BT - in days of yore - had a freephone number that customers could use to check on the resolution of problems, and a web page that showed the problem and the date/time of resolution. At the moment, we seem to rely on Rik to tell us what is going on. All credit to you Rik.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 10:55:23

There still seems to be a tendency to fix the problem first and then tell people as an afterthought. I do nag.

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 11:36:54

If the problem can be fixed in a few minutes I don't personally have a problem with that... and let's face it, it can take a few minutes to be sure that the problem is at IDNet and not elsewhere.

No point reporting until there's something useful to report- simply saying that there's a problem is a waste of time, the users already know that!

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 11:40:08

I'd agree with that, Bill, but today's problems started around 9am and continued until 10:30, on top of which the cause was known (and should now be resolved).

David · Jul 21, 2008, 12:41:25

Quote from: badpianoplayer on Jul 21, 2008, 10:02:49
Mine is OK now panic over

Stopped again ?

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 12:43:01

Still not fully resolved it would seem... still getting occasional timeouts.

Glenn · Jul 21, 2008, 12:43:14

Yep

David · Jul 21, 2008, 12:49:34

Quote from: cavillas on Jul 21, 2008, 10:04:46
Hello badpianoplayer, thought you had deserted us.

Hi Alf would I do such a thing

netn00b · Jul 21, 2008, 12:50:49

cant receive e-mail so i guess its still not working properly.

David · Jul 21, 2008, 12:52:40

looks like I picked the wrong day for urgent stuff

Have Emailed support to see what is going on.The first time I have ever had to

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 13:50:42

It seems fine here, David.

David · Jul 21, 2008, 13:55:58

Back again

David · Jul 21, 2008, 14:35:31

Just heard from James some continuing problems from a few weeks ago and things are not yet back to normal but they will improve,Thanks James will persevere

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 15:41:51

In all honesty, I doubt that a mail outage of 5 or ten minutes is really of very much importance to anybody, even a few times a day. Mildly iritating, but not much more than that.

It's just that after the last couple of events we're all a bit jittery

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 15:47:51

You make a good point, Bill. I guess we've all got a bit trigger happy over mail.

Tacitus · Jul 21, 2008, 15:51:08

Quote from: badpianoplayer on Jul 21, 2008, 14:35:31
Just heard from James some continuing problems from a few weeks ago and things are not yet back to normal but they will improve,Thanks James will persevere

It might have been better if he said exactly what. I doubt it's commercially sensitive.

A simple msg somewhere saying there will be short email outages due to x, y or z would suffice, with a follow up saying all is now normal. They could keep it to the customer portal if they wanted to. IDNet really need to raise their game on the PR side.

Bill · Jul 21, 2008, 16:08:22

Quote from: Tacitus on Jul 21, 2008, 15:51:08
IDNet really need to raise their game on the PR side.

Not to say that IDNet is immune from improvement, but my SO lost her email completely recently, it took her ISP several days to even admit that the whole system was down... and about 6 weeks before it returned to normal.

A sense of proportion...

Tacitus · Jul 21, 2008, 16:53:21

Quote from: Bill on Jul 21, 2008, 16:08:22
Not to say that IDNet is immune from improvement, but my SO lost her email completely recently, it took her ISP several days to even admit that the whole system was down... and about 6 weeks before it returned to normal.
A sense of proportion...

I have a sense of proportion, but coming on top of the recent major problems people are a bit twitchy.

Just because others are c..p doesn't mean iDNet should emulate them. It's a minutes work to post a short notice to all users via the customer portal and here - "We are experiencing email problems on our POP3 servers, which may mean occasional short outages. We are aware of this and are investigating".

It took me 35 seconds to type that, a click of a button and it could go to all customer portals/email to Rik. People would know of the problem, know that iDNet know of the problem and are trying to fix it. Cue posts on iDNetters and maybe TB saying how good they are in being pro-active, whereas others wouldn't be.

Value in PR terms immeasurable. And all for a minutes work.....

Simon · Jul 21, 2008, 16:55:12

I tend to agree that we have perhaps been spoilt by the perfection of IDNet, so any problems seem to hit us hard. I also agree that the mail outages of today have not really been significant enough to warrant undue concerns, but some form of notification from IDNet would have been reassuring, given the events of the last couple of weeks.

Dopamine · Jul 21, 2008, 19:03:24

I too have a sense of proportion, which is why after the recent email shambles I moved all my email away from IDNet. None the less, I still automatically check my old IDNet.com accounts through Outlook Express, and have noticed difficulty throughout the weekend in making contact with IDNet's servers.

Last night I attempted to sign up to kitz.co.uk's forum, and rather than risk having my new domain spammed, I used an IDNet.com email address. The registration confirmation email took just under eight hours to arrive..........

..... by which time I'd got bored with waiting and had signed up to the forum again, this time using a hotmail address. That registration confirmation email arrived almost instantly, so I was able to use the forum. I'll bet a substantial amount of money that the delay with the first email was caused by IDNet's processes, not Kitz's.

Now, I'll be viewed as a whinger, but IDNet's email really is very poor at present and my, and I'd expect others', patience and goodwill has been stretched to breaking point, not by the failures, which IDNet are dealing with, but by their dreadful PR.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 19:07:52

I'm sure this thread will be read by IDNet and its expressed views noted.

Lona · Jul 21, 2008, 19:14:21

I just tried downloading my mail form idnet via outlook express and the delay was about 4 mins.

LesD · Jul 21, 2008, 19:16:32

My IDNet POP3 access is somewhat intermittent this evening.

Anyone else had any problems?

A couple of time now circa 19:10 I have been stuck Authorising and then the do you want to wait another 60 second pop-up appears to which on the two occasions I have had it, saying yes sees the process complete in less than a further 10 seconds.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 19:16:43

I've made sure they are aware there's an ongoing problem, Lona. My own POP accounts are all timing out.

Yes, Les, there does seem to be an issue - I've alerted SimonD.

LesD · Jul 21, 2008, 19:17:36

Ah I see they have.

Rik · Jul 21, 2008, 19:18:07

And I've just edited to include you in my reply, Les.

B52 · Jul 21, 2008, 19:29:52

pop3 mail been intermittent all day today for me.

It has timed out at every logon for past hour. This isnt good. We were told a couple of weeks ago that the problem had been resolved.

Is there any chance of a remedy for this? I hung on last time but am getting really pi**ed off with this now. Its not been right since the big let down last month.

I might be calling for my MAC (Should that be 'I'll get my coat'?)

cavillas · Jul 21, 2008, 19:42:40

I'm sorry I started this thread, I was just asking a simple question..oooopps.

I think Idnet is the best and their email superb.

A little glitch here and there never hurt anyone did it. I have been getting me emails all day now without problems so I'll say no more on it.

LesD · Jul 21, 2008, 20:02:08

Quote from: Rik on Jul 21, 2008, 19:18:07
And I've just edited to include you in my reply, Les.

So I noticed just after I posted mine.

My fingers, never mind my mental processes are just not agile enough to stay abreast on this forum!

P.S An edit to add that my POP3 access is OK again now and has been for about the last half an hour.

Now who was the agitator that started this thread!

Philip · Jul 21, 2008, 21:33:46

I just booked a flight on the London Eye and got a confirmation email almost instantly, so no problems here

Tacitus · Jul 21, 2008, 21:40:41

Quote from: cavillas on Jul 21, 2008, 19:42:40
I'm sorry I started this thread, I was just asking a simple question..oooopps. I think Idnet is the best and their email superb. ....

To be honest Cav I wouldn't have bothered posting as I agree that most of the time a short outage would be pretty much inconsequential. However today happens to be the one day when I need to keep exchanging emails via iDNet on something important. Sod's law isn't it.

It would have been so much easier if support had posted a short message as I outlined in my earlier post. Wouldn't have soothed my temper this morning, but it would have been an acknowledgement they knew of the problems and were trying to fix them.

I'm not trying to whip up a campaign, but they really do need to work out some sort of reliable information system. If nothing else, it would save them dealing with support calls.

Simon · Jul 21, 2008, 22:24:19

Quote from: cavillas on Jul 21, 2008, 19:42:40
I'm sorry I started this thread...

If you hadn't, someone else would have, Alf.

I think the problems today have been manageable, but unwanted and irritating all the same, not least because of the fact that they still seem to be ongoing this evening. I'm sick of hearing myself say this, but IDNet are aware of the issues, and are doing their best to resolve them. Unfortunately, things just don't seem to be working out at the moment, and I agree, not enough information is forthcoming.

Inactive · Jul 21, 2008, 22:30:09

Not sure what all the fuss is about, I rarely use IDNet Mail, there are plenty of free ones that do the job very well.

Sebby · Jul 21, 2008, 22:38:44

True, but I can understand the frustration for those that do use IDNet's mail.

Inactive · Jul 22, 2008, 00:51:34

I learned my lesson at Plusnet that ISP's emails are rarely as reliable as the free ones.

Apart from the fact that they kind of stitch you in to the ISP.

Gary · Jul 22, 2008, 06:57:34

Quote from: Inactive on Jul 22, 2008, 00:51:34
I learned my lesson at Plusnet that ISP's emails are rarely as reliable as the free ones.

Apart from the fact that they kind of stitch you in to the ISP.

Some people dont think like that, In and for them its a pain, some would argue that when you use an ISP's mail it should work, and fo the extra spent on idnet I can see why, but I have free ones and a domain for my main mail, google for online spammable stuff and idnet.com now directed through my domain untill everyone gets the message I have changed addresses.

Saying that I trusted Idnet to host my filtered domain mail, expensive yes, but I like the level of service and who I get at the end of the phone.

Ardua · Jul 22, 2008, 08:56:39

Like many, I do not sit at a computer all day waiting for my e-mails. When I turn my computer on and find that the e-mail system is down then I do not know whether or not it has been down for just a few seconds or for hours. I then look at the ISP's site and find that they are reporting 'Good Service'. I am then left even more confused. Do I ring IDNet to find out whether it is an IDNet problem or do I look elsewhere for an answer ( ie; on this site)? It is not the level of technical service that is likely to drive me away from IDNet, it is the innate lack of customer awareness within IDNet's support team. Sorry it had to be said: I know that others will disagree.

Rik · Jul 22, 2008, 09:04:53

We don't - it concerns us too.

cavillas · Jul 22, 2008, 09:37:43

Quoteit is the innate lack of customer awareness within IDNet's support team. Sorry it had to be said: I know that others will disagree.

I think the Idnet Support team are one of the best in the country, it is the mechanical, electronic and logical idiosyncrasy's of computers that cause all the woes. The support team do a marvelous job and are completely aware of customers concerns, needs and worries.

There I disagreed with you Ardua.