Help! Virgin media have deleted my email account
Discussion
I have been using a virgin.net email account for about 20 years. The account came free when I was a Virgin media customer. I closed my media account back in 2014 when I moved home but still have a mobile phone account with them. I continued using the email account in the belief that it would be supported by my mobile phone account. Yesterday my email account was cut off. I have contacted the relevant tech departments only to be told they cannot do anything as I am no longer a media account holder.
I have created a gmail account which I will have to inform all my contacts which is a major pain.
I am an old technophobe who doesnt like change, hence why I stuck with the old email account.
Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
I have created a gmail account which I will have to inform all my contacts which is a major pain.
I am an old technophobe who doesnt like change, hence why I stuck with the old email account.
Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
You’ve already done as much as you can (for free) to mitigate it happening again by getting a gmail account. As mentioned, it’s best never to rely on an ISP provided email as you are likely to change ISP at some point. The only risk with Google would be going out of business (unlikely I’d say) or they start charging - and if the latter were to happen at least it won’t be deleted and you can move again in your own time. I am ignoring their use of your data as an issue if that sort of thing concerns you but that’s why it’s free.
orange n blue said:
I am an old technophobe who doesnt like change, hence why I stuck with the old email account.
Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
Only piece of advice i can give is to accept it is sometimes worth choosing change when you have some control over it rather than avoiding it until it is forced upon you. Sorry :-(Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
orange n blue said:
I am an old technophobe who doesnt like change, hence why I stuck with the old email account.
Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
Just to be ageist and use your own words to pick on you Is there anything I can do to prevent future issues.
Make sure you're using a unique password and if possible turn on multi-factor authentication.
It'll stop someone guessing or stealing your password from other sites and getting access to your email.
My mum and dad still use their original 25 year old AOL email addresses, and they are the only email addresses they have ever had. My dad uses his for business dealings and suchlike, and it does get a laugh occasionally when he gives out his email address.
I have mentioned to them that it may be a good idea to change to gmail or something like that, but they can't be bothered to change.
They stopped being paying customers of AOL at some point around 2007-2009 at a guess.
I wonder how much longer AOL can keep providing all these free email accounts when I don't think I know a single person who is a paying customer anymore? I presume their parent company is happy to keep providing email for free.
I have mentioned to them that it may be a good idea to change to gmail or something like that, but they can't be bothered to change.
They stopped being paying customers of AOL at some point around 2007-2009 at a guess.
I wonder how much longer AOL can keep providing all these free email accounts when I don't think I know a single person who is a paying customer anymore? I presume their parent company is happy to keep providing email for free.
I have an active virgin.net address. What would be the best way to transfer this to a newer, more robust email supplier, and be able to transfer or backup my historical emails? My life nowadays is considerably lighter, and as such, most of my comms are done via iPad. I haven’t had to use a PC for while now. Is this even possible with a free service?
normalbloke said:
I have an active virgin.net address. What would be the best way to transfer this to a newer, more robust email supplier, and be able to transfer or backup my historical emails? My life nowadays is considerably lighter, and as such, most of my comms are done via iPad. I haven’t had to use a PC for while now. Is this even possible with a free service?
Easiest.1. Set up a free gmail account.
2. Set up forwarding of all new mail in the virgin.net account to the gmail account - but see step 5 if you want to move old virgin.net mail to gmail.
3. Set up a flag in the gmail account of anything arriving from virgin.net account.
4. Change the email address on everything you used the virgin.net account for, and as new email arrives in your gmail account and is flagged from virgin.net - well change those as you forgot about them.
5. If you want the old emails moved over from virgin.net to gmail then use the ‘add a mail account’ in gmail and enter your virgin.net details - if you do this then skip step 2 as no need to forward as the pop collection will gather new messages as they arrive and if you don’t the emails will be duplicated.
But… you will still miss some people who will use your old email address at some random time in the future - just try and make sure it isn’t anything important.
Edited by PF62 on Monday 16th August 14:13
PF62 said:
normalbloke said:
I have an active virgin.net address. What would be the best way to transfer this to a newer, more robust email supplier, and be able to transfer or backup my historical emails? My life nowadays is considerably lighter, and as such, most of my comms are done via iPad. I haven’t had to use a PC for while now. Is this even possible with a free service?
Easiest.1. Set up a free gmail account.
2. Set up forwarding of all new mail in the virgin.net account to the gmail account - but see step 5 if you want to move old virgin.net mail to gmail.
3. Set up a flag in the gmail account of anything arriving from virgin.net account.
4. Change the email address on everything you used the virgin.net account for, and as new email arrives in your gmail account and is flagged from virgin.net - well change those as you forgot about them.
5. If you want the old emails moved over from virgin.net to gmail then use the ‘add a mail account’ in gmail and enter your virgin.net details - if you do this then skip step 2 as no need to forward as the pop collection will gather new messages as they arrive and if you don’t the emails will be duplicated.
But… you will still miss some people who will use your old email address at some random time in the future - just try and make sure it isn’t anything important.
Edited by PF62 on Monday 16th August 14:13
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