Email abroad

[ghines]

I am having big problems using email abroad. It worked when I first got here but has now stopped working. I also can’t get into my BT broadband account to sort things out - it keeps sending me back to the login page despite having just changed the password. I can’t contact BT because the “chat” button on the support page never appears. There is no email support line. The only option is to call which, judging on how long call wait times are at the moment, would cost me a small fortune. 

So, BT, if you have moderators reading this: get your act together because I don’t want to waste any more of my holiday sorting out your rubbish email service (and even more rubbish support service). I am a paying customer of BT and am feeling severely let down. I need to access my email because my airline has my non-working email as their way of contacting me in the event of delays etc  

I have tried all the suggestions on the forum in terms of VPN usage etc. but nothing works. 

I await with little expectation or hope that someone from BT will respond…

[gg30340]

This is a BT residential customer to customer forum. Your post does not go to BT. The only BT staff are the forum moderators who do not necessarily read all the posts.

Why did you change your password, was your account compromised or did you get an error message that you were using the wrong password?

How are you trying to access your email account?

Is it by using a web browser or by using an email client/app?

Are you using a broadband connection or are you using a mobile connection?

[ghines · Accepted solution]

It told me that my account had been compromised and asked for a password reset. However, the security questions that were recorded in BT's system were wrong and so I couldn't reset it.  I spent 2 hours on the support chat and they couldn't sort it out. They gave me an email address of an escalation team but my email to them went unanswered. There was a telephone support number but, frankly, this would be prohibitively expensive from abroad at £2.60/minute from my mobile and probably more from a hotel phone.

When I got home, I called BT and they sorted it out within 10 minutes. Maybe it's just luck of the draw who you get on the support line. 

I shall be migrating away from my BT email because its "suspicious" activity detectors are obviously too sensitive; other people seem to have had the same problem as indeed have I previously. Also, the support operation is based on the UK timezone which is not a lot of help when you're abroad in another timezone.  I shall use an email provider that has 24/7 support.  I sort of don't mind when things go wrong but I do need a support operation that can deal with it effectively.

[Scienceboy]

I have suffered with this as well. Apparently BT doesn't know what the first two Ws mean in WWW.

BT email (they told me) will only work in the UK. That's all it's been set up to do. If you have the temerity to travel past it's shores you will be treated like you're on a small boat in a sea of electrons.

I had to reset my password so many times, my wife has given up completely and only uses gmail.

So it should work if you use a VPN set to the UK, unless BT decides to add that IP to it's blacklist.

I'm in the weird position now where although I'm back in the UK, BT email will ONLY work if I use a VPN set to the UK.
It is just so poor.

[ghines]

Yes, I've given up on BT Internet and now use Outlook.  It does get upset when I first use it abroad via a VPN but it's dead easy to tell it "everything's OK" by logging into Outlook webpage and confirming that recent activity was actually you and then it works fine: no need to repeatedly reset passwords, call their call centre, stand on one leg in a bucket of sangria etc.  A far cry from BT's labyrinthine productivity prevention software.

[gg30340]

BTMail does work in other countries. I am presently abroad and I travel frequently at least twice a year and have done so for more years than I can remember.

On every occasion my email has worked using email clients and webmail without problem or with a VPN.

My wife has also had no problems with her email account so what you say you were told by BT about it not working outside the UK is rubbish.

[licquorice]

One thing is certain, it isn't a generic problem.

I have had btinternet email since it was first introduced and have never had a problem when using it abroad and that includes China and India. I don't know why some folks have problems and others don't but it certainly seems to be the case.

[ghines]

You're lucky or I'm unlucky.  I've tried using with Windows email clients, iOS email clients, web interface, with and without VPN, over WiFi and 4G and it was extremely unreliable and locked me out.  Password resets didn't work and I was invited to call BT's call centre (from the Maldives no less) during UK office hours to resolve it.  Heaven knows what that would have cost.  And it wasn't an isolated occurrence - it happened on multiple visits overseas.  As I say, maybe I'm  just not a lucky guy.

[DJG_Shef]

My experience is that it's fine until BT mail decides you need to re-login. At this point it won't recognise your credentials. This means that it works abroad until it doesn't, and then you're stuck.

I did however manage to log in to my mail via BT.com on my phone's browser, which was a life saver.

This is very concerning if it's a problem for a significant number of people.

[ghines]

Your response comes at an opportune moment.  I was abroad last week (Spain, France and Italy, and on a ship with satellite WiFi).  As recommended by all and sundry, I used a VPN while connected to WiFi hotspots.  BT decided this was suspicous (OK, fair enough) and locked my account.  The email informing me of this had a link for me to report that everything was OK.  The link was broken.  Having wasted countless hours trying to reset my password from abroad on previous trips, I thought I'd wait until I got home given that I have now nearly completely migrated to an Outlook email address.  (Incidentally, Outlook similarly flagged my VPN-login as suspicious but the link to their system worked first time and I was able to access my Outlook email again within 15 seconds and without any further interruptions throughout my trip.)

When I got home, I reset my password on BT website and set about changing the password stored in my email client apps (on Windows and iOS).  Without changing *any* server settings (i.e. only changing the password), I'm now only able to receive emails over IMAP but am unable to send over SMTP.  I revisited BT's email client setup pages to make sure nothing had changed but it's all set up in accordance with their instructions.

I called BT support who suggested I only use webmail instead of email clients.  So, to use BT's email, I have to dispense with the desirable functionality of email clients and revert to using a pretty basic web interface instead?  BT's support also suggested that, as a UK organization, they don't have the resources of a Microsoft to support international use.  Fine, so my conclusion is that if you plan to use email abroad, don't use BT.  I've been gradually migrating to Outlook over the previous year or so and have travelled extensively in that time and have never had a problem with Outlook but BT continues to give me hassle.  My migration away from BT will be complete very soon and so my woes will be over.

I know that people have previously commented here that they don't have a problem using BT email abroad and I'm very happy for them.  For me, the bottom line is that there's something fundamentally flaky about it that makes it OK for some people and consistently unreliable for others.  Nobody seems to know why.  I'm not doing anything radical and, after a 30-year career in IT, I'm not a total novice.