We moved over from BT broadband to virgin fibre about 6 months ago, and paid for BT premium email so we could keep our email addresses, for no apparent reason we are unable we are unable to reply any emails we get, we are able to receive them but not reply or compose new and send them, we keep getting prompted to enter the email password, yet all works well from the BT webmail on google chrome.
This morning I turned off the Virgin hub for half an hour and while the broadband was off were were able to reply, compose and receive email to all our devices, i.e. iPhone email app, android email app and outlook on our windows PC and laptops, is there something I'm missing or need to do as it is driving us nuts?, BT support tell me to login to the webmail but this isn't always convenient, and would prefer to keep using outlook, any help gratefully received, many thanks, Chris.
Many thanks Alessandro, I have tried all that, no success I'm afraid, I have raised the issue with Virgin so hopefully their techies will be able to solve this, I have attached
images of the error messages I get when composing and trying to send/reply to emails
I've flagged your screenshot to the ModTeam as the upper section shows your full email address.
Check your BT email settings in Outlook are set up correctly. See https://www.bt.com/help/email/manage-email-account/manual-settings/what-are-the-settings-for-outgoing-and-incoming-bt-email-servers
I see you said the you are subscribed to BT premium email, but suggest you double check that it has been set up correctly and is still active. If it isn't then you will be downgraded to BTMail Basic which can only be used on a web browser and not with email apps or clients.
To check you can call BT on 0808 100 6778, Monday to Friday 9am to 9pm, Saturday and Sunday 9am to 6pm.
many thanks for the reply, yes accidently left the address intact , I spent the whole day on this yesterday BT said because the email was working from a web browser as far as they were concerned it was working correctly, also checked that I am subscribed to premium and I am and being billed accordingly, and so much so it has given me a migraine as the whole family are moaning their email is not working, I'm at a loss really, also checked the server settings too.
It would be helpful to see what error code is returned by the SMTP server in this situation. From a desktop or laptop device open a Command Prompt and enter the following where username:password is replaced with your BT email address and password, i.e. for a Virgin Media account it would be similar to richard.branson@virginmedia.com:rotavator-racecar-tenet-repaper:
Warning Do not post the resulting output here but instead review it for possible reported causes, i.e. error code returned by SMTP server; choosing to ignore this advice and posting the unredacted or incorrectly redacted output here will likely reveal your email address, password and / or public IP Address.
FYI if there is no issue then you should see a similar result to the following output from the curl command:
⋮
> AUTH PLAIN
< 334
> [Redacted]
< 235 2.7.0 SMTP350 Authentication successful for user [Redacted]
> HELP
< 214-2.0.0 This is cmsmtp ESMTP service help
214-2.0.0 This is cmsmtp ESMTP service help
< 214-2.0.0 To contact postmaster send email to postmaster@virginmedia.com.
214-2.0.0 To contact postmaster send email to postmaster@virginmedia.com.
< 214-2.0.0 For local information send email to Postmaster at your site.
214-2.0.0 For local information send email to Postmaster at your site.
< 214 2.0.0 end of HELP info
214 2.0.0 end of HELP info
* Connection #0 to host smtp.virginmedia.com left intact
Otherwise an unsuccessful result will look similar to the following:
Still no solution to this, or any contact from Virgin on this whatsoever, the only way to get email to send or reply is to turn off Wi-Fi, so it is definitely an issue with the hub 3.0 or a setting therein, so I think I'll be dumping Virgin at the end of my contract this year.
My wife is also unable to send email from her phone or laptop within the home, yet if we turn wifi off on the virgin hub 3.0 email sends fine, have attached screenshot of the port.
Do BT also support SMTP on port 587 with startTLS ? (how would I find this out?)
As far as BT are concerned I can access my email from a web browser and send/reply to messages, so they say it is working fine, everything seems to point to the router, it is as if it is not letting email through, I am not tech savvy enough to know, and Virgin don't seem to have a basic level of customer support, so as soon as my contract is up this year I'm off, thanks to everyone here that has tried to help, much appreciated.
Also, have you tried temporarily putting the VM hub into modem mode and connecting only a laptop to the hub with an ethernet cable (modem mode will give you a new IP address for the hub). It won't fix your problem long-term but might help diagnose if your VM IP address is playing any part in the issue. Back up your hub settings before trying modem mode if you have lots of custom configurations set.
Reading up on BT email, it seems to have a similar status to the VM email service, a twilight service which is still going but does not seem to have a long term future. There seems to be no shortage of online topics about BT email users being locked out of BT email for inexplicable reasons (inc trying to use it abroad, trying to use email clients etc. etc.).
Edit: Your email settings look correct as per the link from newapollo at the start of the topic.
“paid for BT premium email so we could keep our email addresses,”
Personally, I would double, if necessary triple check that with BT.
The issue of BT down grading BT email accounts from Premium to Basic often comes up on the BT Community forum.
The Basic BT email service does not allow you to use an email app or client to manage your BT emails, you can only use BT webmail.
“I turned off the Virgin hub for half an hour and while the broadband was off were were able to reply, compose and receive email to all our device”
So were those devices connected using a mobile network (as opposed to your VM wifi)? If so that effectively rules out the Premium / Basic BT email issue I mentioned as the cause of the problem.
“Do BT also support SMTP on port 587 with startTLS ? (how would I find this out?)”
The answer to that is “No” but here are the settings for BT email server settings.
IMAP settings
Incoming Mail Server: mail.btinternet.com
Port: 993, this should be automatically populated by selecting the SSL encryption
SSL Encryption: Enabled but not STARTTLS
Username: your email address including the @btinternet or @btopenworld.com part
Password: your btinternet or btopenworld password
Please do not enable secure password authentication (SPA). It's not needed when you use SSL encryption and will not work.
SMTP settings
Outgoing Mail Server: mail.btinternet.com
Port: 465 (this may not be automatically populated on selecting SSL, so you'll need to check)
SSL Encryption: Enabled (but not STARTTLS)
Authentication: PLAIN
Username: your email address including the @btinternet or @btopenworld.com part
confirms that Outlook is able to connect to the BT email MX (server) over your VM wifi but the BT server is falling to authenticate your account credentials. However, it is possible that BT are blocking your VM IP address for some reason. If you can send emails from Outlook over a mobile data connection that also suggests it’s your VM IP address is being blocked by BT.
Sorry I cannot be more helpful with a solution but I hope you get it sorted.
Turning the router off for an hour seems to have fixed the issue, assuming this caused the VM hub to be issued with a new IP address, again, very grateful for everyone who took time to help here :)
