bt email IMAP and SMTP stopped working

[smami01]

3 days ago all my email clients stopped working with my bt email address.  Wemail still works OK

I started a chat with BT - told to change my password - did that but problem not solved

I chatted with another BT person - they send me instructions unrealted to my problem.

There could be an issue with some of the email servers.

I raised an issue and just got a call from BT saying they do not support email clients.  I tried to explain that the BT website says that IMAP and SMTP are supported but the person had no idea what these were.  They want to close the issue.

I am absolutely disgusted with the service that I have received.  

[CJT80]

@smami01

Just to advise that this is mainly a customer to customer forum, we help eachother. 

From time to time a moderator becomes involved to assist a customer. 

If you need some help, we will do what we can, if you are VERY unhappy and want some sort of recorse, this may not be the place to get it. 

Hope this helps, 

[gg30340]

As far as BT are concerned, they provide an email service through webmail and if your webmail is working they have fulfilled their obligation.

BT do allow email clients to be used and they provide the relevant servers so that they can be used but they do not offer support for email client programs. The reason for this is that there are so many email clients on the market that they have no control over them and they could not possible provide knowledgeable support for them all.

So that forum members may be able to help can you state which BT email system you are on. Is it BTMail or BTYahoo. If you are not sure, log onto webmail and if you see Yahoo in the BT logo you are on BTYahoo email system.

If you can also state which email client you are using.

[smami01]

Well - I noticed that my Outlook 2016 stopped working a on Monday morning.  Also my Android mail client.  So I tried to set up Windows 10 email client on another computer.  However, web mail was working

When that didn't work I called BT for help.

I tried them again this morning  and when they were still not working I raised an issue.

I believed that this indicated there could be some kind of server fault - and I hoped that this would be accepted by BT and worked on.  Instead I was just fobbed off.

After the unhelpful call I just had I tried again and reset up the Android and Windows 10 email and wonderful they now work. 

[Andy_N]

---

@smami01wrote:

3 days ago all my email clients stopped working with my bt email address.  Wemail still works OK

I started a chat with BT - told to change my password - did that but problem not solved

I chatted with another BT person - they send me instructions unrealted to my problem.

---

Hi, you've come to the correct place.

The helpdesk, live chat and btcare twitter have shown time after time that they have no idea with regard email issues. They can give incorrect information, and at times fob the user off with useless details irrelevant to the query.

As has been requested, you need to find out if you're with BTYahoo or BTMail.

With the former, typically logging in via :

https://mail.yahoo.com

can kickstart app/client access.

If with BTMail, then usually this can last a few hours to a few days - but normally requires no changes to be made.

As you've changed the password, then sometimes this doesn't sync properly, so app access could still be with the old password. Also at times, if you change the password and don't wait at least 15 minutes before trying app/client access, then it still fails. In this case, a new password change could be done - but wait for at least 15 minutes before trying clients. If the clients are set to auto poll the servers, then stop them prior to password change.

[smami01 · Accepted solution]

Thanks - I am still with BT Yahoo mail.

Thankfully the problem has now resolved itself.

[gg30340]

Good to hear that they are now working. 

For future reference, as long as your webmail is working and if you have done nothing that may have caused the problem such as changing settings or carried out an update of the email client, you should not change any password or settings.

The BT servers seem to be a bit flaky at times but they generally get sorted out within a few days and it is best to wait rather than starting to change things.

[jlovie]

This seems to be a lot worse than usual for the last week or so.

I now keep the Yahoo login page as a bookmark, so I can check if the Yahoo bit is broken regularly.

It's obvious to anyone, many on these forums, who have looked into this that it's a problem with BT/Yahoo mail servers.

If only someone at BT could understand this and investigate this instead of fobbing off their long-standing customers.

[eatonsmith]

This has happened to me. Using IMAP and all 3 devices having a problem with email, webmail all OK just not on my devices. BT Chat exteremely unhelpful. I haven't changed anything so it must be something at their end.

[gg30340]

Do nothing. Do NOT change password or try setting up your email again. Just wait and the service will normally resolve its self in a day or two.