Lost access to virgin.net email address

[NeilCollett]

Hi,

I am working on behalf of my client, who has lost access to her email account. She believes she set up the account around 15 years ago and always worked through her mail app, never needing to log in online.

Her account was removed by an IT technician, and, of course, could not be re-added as he did not know the account's password. My client has attempted to gain access by going through the forgotten password process, but unfortunately, the system does not recognize her. She tried calling support at Virgin, but unless you have either a mobile number or an account number, you cannot get through to anyone for support.

She has been running a couple of businesses through the account and understandably is very concerned that she cannot access it at present. Could someone please provide guidance on what can be done? The account was fine last Thursday, and I have done an email checker which shows the account is active.

Many thanks in advance

Neil

[jpeg1]

Virginmedia provide an email service as an adjunct to a residential broadband account. It was never intended for business use.

If your client does not have an account number, this suggests that they do not have a current Virginmedia broadband account.

Under the original T&C's, email accounts are supposed to be closed 90 days after the broadband account is closed, but Virginmedia has been very lax in doing this. Recently however they have been proactively closing what they call "orphaned accounts". This seems to be done in such a way that the access is closed in stages, which can mean that the account appears to be present but cannot be accessed. 

If your client does in fact have a Virginmedia broadband account, staff here may be able to assist. If not then your client may have to resort to whatever backups they have made. 

[Graham_A]

@NeilCollett  jpeg1  is absolutely on the ball

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@jpeg1 wrote:

Virginmedia provide an email service as an adjunct to a residential broadband account. It was never intended for business use.

If your client does not have an account number, this suggests that they do not have a current Virginmedia broadband account.

Under the original T&C's, email accounts are supposed to be closed 90 days after the broadband account is closed, but Virginmedia has been very lax in doing this. Recently however they have been proactively closing what they call "orphaned accounts". This seems to be done in such a way that the access is closed in stages, which can mean that the account appears to be present but cannot be accessed. 

If your client does in fact have a Virginmedia broadband account, staff here may be able to assist. If not then your client may have to resort to whatever backups they have made. 

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here. VM broadband accounts and associated free email addresses have always only allowed a business use in restricted circumstances.  As your client is having issues with a virgin.net email address then this probably dates back to the early days of dial up access or via an ADSL connection, both of which VM stopped supplying from ten years ago.  You can read more about orphaned email accounts here: https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Email/Orphan-Email-accounts/td-p/3492073/jump-to/first-unread-m...

[NeilCollett]

Thank you both for taking the time to answer my query, really appreciated. 

[jpeg1]

Your client might like to get her own domain and paid-for email service, which would cost her less than £100 a year. 

[Arissa_H]

Hi NeilCollett.

Thank you for coming back to us on this thread. 

Glad our community can help 😊.

Let us know if you need anything else.

Thank you.