Virgin Media Community

[randv69]

Hope someone from the Community or VM team can help where the phone support and WhattsApp assistants had no idea of the issue I was trying to explain.

I have a blueyonder e-mail address which was used for many years and is still active. The VM account with which this e-mail box was set-up has been closed and I can no longer log into VM on-line to manage this account... Maybe fair enough if hosting of the associated e-mail address had also ceased with a notice period...

However, it still works so I carried on using it. e-bay, paypal and facebook have all recently reported suspicious log in attempts and password reset requests which were not initiated by me. I've exhausted VM help team's powers by asking if they can put a block or help me change the password on this e-mail account which they are still hosting (this is the bit that really threw them) All they could do was repeatedly tell me that the account isn't active and they can't lock the e-mail account and they have no way to help me reset the password.

Surely, surely someone in the world of Virgin Media understands that the e-mail hosting bit of this closed account is still very much active and needs to be able to be serviced and managed by me or your support team, considering it has a lot of my personal details associated with it. Or at least just tell me you will cease to host it and all the mail history and account holder details will be deleted would also be fine!

As it stands I can only conclude that VM are happy being breach of the Data Protection Act and waiting for me to take further action.

Of course I'd rather not. Any solutions?!

[coenoby]

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@randv69 wrote:

Surely, surely someone in the world of Virgin Media understands that the e-mail hosting bit of this closed account is still very much active and needs to be able to be serviced and managed by me or your support team

Any solutions?!

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I am not sure I'm "in the world of Virgin Media", I'm just a VM customer but I do know exactly what you are talking about. 😉

To give you the background:

VM say in their Terms and Conditions that if you close your broadband account you can no longer use any email account associated with it . See section  D6 here:  the-legal-stuff/terms-and-conditions-for-fibre-optic-services-pre-oct-2021   However, they do give you 90 days grace before they close the account.

To explain the situation you are seeing with your Blueyonder account:

In fact what often seems to happen when VM "close" an email account is that they close your Webmail account so you can no longer access the account via their website but they often  leave the mailbox itself still in place. The reason you have been able to carry on using it is because you are using an email app on your phone or email client such as Outlook to manage your emails. Such email apps and clients do not use the VM webmail account to download or send your emails. The SMTP, IMAP/POP3 protocols they use effectively address your VM mailbox directly and so they can continue to operate normally.

What happens going forward?

Well, VM could catch up with this situation at any time and simply close your mailbox without giving you any warning. That would mean your email app / client would no longer be able to send  or receive your emails and you would be left without an email account.  Also, because  you are no longer a VM broadband customer the VM support staff are very limited in what they can do for you. That is probably why you did not get much joy from the phone support agents.

The only long term solution is to get your mailbox fully deleted and stop any hackers or scammers from using it.

The good news is that the Forum Team (VM employees who support this forum) can arrange to get that done for you. One of them will catch up with your post in a day or so and contact you via this thread so keep an eye out for that.

In the meantime I would suggest that you take steps to back up and save the Blueyonder emails along with what you referred to as "personal details" you currently have on your email app .  That way, you will still have save copies if anything happens to the data in your app. If you do not already have backups in place you are currently running a big risk of losing it if anything misbehaves.

I hope that's helpful. Wait for the Forum Team to contact you and advise them if you want the mailbox closed.

Coenoby

Edited to add - Sorry I forgot to say that you'll also need to open a new email account, preferably not one from another broadband provider.

[randv69]

Thank you very much for your detailed reply,  your username is very fitting!

The advice you gave I have actually already done and moved over/updated correspondence for most of my important stuff as I was expecting it to simply cease working. In the places where it has caused me issues I had neglected to make my new email address "primary" but I don't use fb & eBay that often and had a sobering wake up call for being lazy.

Anyway, would be a great resolution to simply get the mail box closed down / deleted as it perhaps should have already been.

It's a pity with a situation where personal data is at risk that the help staff are not given powers to do this. Saying that,  when I said "VM are still hosting an active mailbox for that closed account" I sensed a massive wooooosh!

Glad I reached out to the VM community because I was left with the feeling that shoulders were being shrugged.

Thanks once again first you find time in replying

Rich

[Gareth_L]

Hello randv69

Sorry you have had the correct help so far 

If I can send you a private message "purple envelope" 

I can get this orphaned email address closed for you 

Normally takes around 5 days, but recently it has been much quicker

Gareth_L

[randv69]

Many thanks.

DM sent with requested details.

Rich

[Gareth_L]

Hi randv69

I have just had a reply back from our IT Team

The emails have now been deleted for you 

Gareth_L

[Lee_R · Accepted solution]

Hi randv69

Thanks for getting back to us.  My colleague will liaise with you directly.

Regards

Lee_R

[randv69]

Hi Lee

Thanks,  but all is resolved now by your colleague who replied previously.

Many thanks again to community for helping out where the main sources were powerless.

Rich

[Zak_M]

Glad to hear that you have managed to get this resolved @randv69. 

Kind regards,

Zak_M

[danjrudge]

A really useful set of messages, thank you. I have the same problem. Can anyone help? 

I seem to have an orphaned email which needs to be closed so anyone emailing it gets their mail bounced back. Is this possible?

I left VM about 3 years ago, but the email has just recently (last 3 months) stopped working. Can you help? Below is the forum post. Many thanks,

Dan