Email & changing broadband providers

[itma]

Thinking of leaving Virgin, and have lots of things referring to a virgin email address.

When changing, does one necessarily lose access to the old email box?
Is it usual to be able to set up a continuing forwarding arrangement?

What email experiences have members had when changing provider?

 

[enrico]

I use gmail now. I still have a virgin.net email that I can still use. I am with bt but no problem accessing my virgin email. All my email addresses (4) are forwarded to my gmail with no problem at all.
If you threaten virgin that you are going to change provider they will probably match or better any other offer! I have done that with bt frequently.
E

 

[alanf]

...When changing, does one necessarily lose access to the old email box?...

Depends on the provider. In general, once you stop paying they have no interest in you so you lose the email address. In many ways it's in their interest to cut you off because it makes customers more reluctant to move.

They may not get round to it immediately, I recall vaguely that some providers do allow you to pay for just the mail service. But I have heard most cut you off without warning when they have a periodic clear up.

If anyone asks, I'd say don't use an ISP provided email address or an employer address because you might want to change it and I do get emails from old contacts to addresses that have not changed for 25 years. I've changed providers several times since then either to get cheaper deals or better service. Two ways out, one is use a general internet email service. Gmail is popular, Microsoft have rebranded their hotmail but the old addresses still work. Yahoo used to be good but recent developments have put many people off. They are the biggest three providers, there are other niche providers but the big three are likely to be most stable..

The other and most reliable option is to rent your own domain name. For a few pounds a year you have your own professional looking address. Many hosting companies include a forwarding service in the annual fee that you can point at a gmail account for instance, set the "reply to" to your own domain on gmail and nobody need know you're using a free web service. If there's something about gmail you don't like swap it to hotmail or even your current ISP.

 

[jd101k2000]

Hi ITMA,

I move people's email addresses for a living. (Someone has to.)
You may be able to set up Virgin to forward your emails, but they are really under no obligation to keep that going when you leave them. I'm not saying that they won't do it, but don't depend on it.

It is best to get any new email address established with your friends, relatives, business contacts before you leave Virgin. (Preferably a couple of months overlap.) Don't forget to update banks, and places that you log into with your email address (Amazon, eBay, etc,).

Free options include: Gmail, Outlook.com, Yahoo.co.uk

The advantage of using them rather than your telephone provider is, as you are finding now, if you ever change telephone provider your email stays the same.

If you want something with your own domain e.g. [email protected] (assuming it is available) then you can purchase it for about £5 - £6 p.a. A paid for email system need only cost £0.80pcm. on top of that. (As an example, I currently sell a ten user system with bottomless email for £1.83pcm - but I'm not on here to sell... so I won't tell you how to get it unless you p.m. me.)
Then there is a question of what you do with your historic emails... you may have few that you want to keep or 10s of thousands. You may be happy migrating that or you may need help.

I hope that helps.

 

[drstitson]

"When changing, does one necessarily lose access to the old email box?"

yes. your email account finishes when your broadband account closes. virgin can set-up temporary access to retrieve old mails on request BUT you'll be needing to ensure everything/one who had details of your virgin email is updated with your new address.

 

[enrico]

I have not been with virgin for ten years. I still use the email address!

 

[alanf]

I have not been with virgin for ten years. I still use the email address!

We still have a working Freeserve address. Slightly different sales model in that it was "sold" as a dial up access originally. Freeserve has changed hands several times, and I might have a working modem in the loft. At one time , every few months you had to logon to the Wanadoo/Orange website to keep it alive but haven't done that for a while. I suspect we're in a batch of user ids which are so few and forgotten that nobody at France Telecom can be bothered to turn them off.

The point is that there is no contract or commercial deal for the account to be kept working. So there is no way I can rely on it. It could stay live for years or be turned off tomorrow. It's no longer important, there are commercial messages from companies last used years ago. Every so often something turns up from somebody using an old email list. You remind them of the current addresses, but not everyone is as organised online as we might assume.

There are current reports that Facebook is in decline. No single provider will last forever. Best bet is to go with an industry standard not dependant on any single company. If you own the name you can host it where you like or use it as a forwarder to a convenient service, but that remains in your control. I have been using email for over 30 years (my first .ac). Providers and employers come and go, merge and get taken over, but I can't see the domain naming and mail protocols disappearing in the next 30 years.

Next best is one of the big three online email providers. They probably have enough inertia and value in an established user base to be worth maintaining for 10 or so years.

 

[VEG]

I have an email addy from tiny the PC company from about 18 years ago and still use it

 

[BeeJayBee]

I have not been with virgin for ten years. I still use the email address!

You were lucky, our accounts were deleted almost before we switched ISP from them.

 

[itma]

Many thanks for the responses. "Don't count on it staying live, but it might" looks like the conclusion.

 

[Dishmop]

Virgin uses Gmail. Terrible user unfriendly systems. Hotmail no better.
I use Outlook Express 6 which you cant use with anything higher than XP. ( I think) I use it to scoop up email from all the addresses that use, and can also reply with it. I can see everything on one page and am able to see what is in an email without "opening" it.

An option I use is to purchase a web site address and with that you get an email address, or several.

Don't forget to update banks, and places that you log into with your email address (Amazon, eBay, etc,).

I get loads of people complain that I didnt answer them. They forget to change their email within ebay.