TalkTalk marches OneTel users into a brave new email world
- Reference: 1601900609
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/10/05/talktalk_onetel/
- Source link:
"We'll be upgrading your email in a few days," the company breathlessly told Register reader Martin Parker, skipping over the fact that his legacy account would actually be toast by the following day.
TalkTalk has form when it comes to this sort of thing. [1]Last year the company warned holders of legacy Tiscali emails accounts to expect to start paying the company some money or face the prospect of shuttered mailboxes.
It is now the turn of the [2]legacy OneTel email platform (acquired in 2006) to receive a forceful nudge into the TalkTalk light.
While messages should survive the update, the calendar, contact list, and message rules won't.
The upgrade of the email addresses of the former Centrica offshoot kicked off in September, and the company told The Register that emails were sent to customers warning them the upgrade was happening, with a further email sent five days before the migration was due to occur.
For Parker, it was quite a bit less than five days. It was less than one.
Complicating matters further is that once upgraded, customers can no longer use the OneTel email platform, and must log in via TalkTalk's Mail interface. TalkTalk told us: "This upgrade does come with benefits, in comparison to the old email platform it is more reliable and super secure."
Getting into it, however, is an entirely different matter. Parker is not alone – a glance at TalkTalk's forums indicates that things are not going swimmingly for former OneTel customers. One found that, since the upgrade, their previous login credentials no longer worked and [3]complained : "I cannot believe how the instructions are so muddled and unclear."
While TalkTalk's staffers [4]insisted that users needed to switch to using their full email address rather than just their old username, others have continued to struggle. And yes, [5]like those other legacy platforms , you'll need a paid-up TalkTalk account.
We contacted TalkTalk, and the company confirmed that those who did not wish to use its broadband would need to pay to use its email service.
"TalkTalk Mail is a service we offer free to our 4.2 million broadband customers. However, providing high quality and secure email comes at a cost to our business, and we don't think it's fair that our current customers should subsidise those who are no longer with us.
"For that reason, we ask for a small charge of £5.00 per month, or £50.00 if you pay in advance for a year. You are free to cancel your account at any point – there's no contract. If you are paying a year in advance and want to cancel early, you will get a pro-rata refund based how much of your annual subscription is left."
The company also insisted it had given plenty of notice that TalkTalk Mail Plus had a charge, and that those less than keen on the idea could potter off to an alternative provider.
In the meantime, the last word belongs to Parker, who told us: "I will miss my old Onetel account. We had a lot of good times together.
"TalkTalk I won't miss." ®
* [6]It's not [PDF].
Get our [7]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2019/10/04/talktalk_kills_tiscali_legacy_email_addresses/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2005/12/19/carphone_onetel/
[3] https://community.talktalk.co.uk/t5/Email-Webmail/Migration-to-TalkTalk-from-Onetel/td-p/2630784
[4] https://community.talktalk.co.uk/t5/Email-Webmail/Problems-with-Onetel-mail/td-p/2631351
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2019/10/04/talktalk_kills_tiscali_legacy_email_addresses/
[6] https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/201434/comparing-service-quality-2019.pdf
[7] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Begging for Trouble
Because many online sites would flag your card as 'used fraudulently' if your email address was not an ISP one.
Because checking the delivery address and registered card address match is so hard........
Re: Can't imagine why anyone ever used an ISP email account.
You can't imagine a lazy person who just uses what they're given?
You have a shit imagination.
Re: Begging for Trouble
Can't imagine why anyone ever used an ISP email account.
As opposed to what, GMail, Outlook.com, Yahoo?
Re: Begging for Trouble
At least they don't change if you switch ISPs.
Re: Begging for Trouble
At least they're telling people this time even if it's only one day. Talk Talk killed Homechoice off and failed to mention it. My folks discovered this had happened only when email stopped working on their phones. There wasn't a pay option like despite them sticking with Balk Balk for broadband. Trying to find out what had happened was "fun". No one had told the staff in India that Balk Balk owned it through their ownership of Tiscali who had slurped it themselves. So denials it was anything to to with them rang out loud and clear despite that being bollocks. Even after complaining repeatedly there wasn't any help from India. They also struggled with my (non existent) accent. Suggesting to yet another rep that their email was @homechoice.co.uk got the normal response:
Bloke: "No you mean @talktalk.net don't you"
Me: "It's what I just said it was and I can spell it out phonetically if you need it."
Bloke: That's not one of our email addresses sir.
Me: Yes it is do a WHOIS search for Homechoice.co.uk
Bloke: Ah well I don't have any information on that.
Me: Great!
Bloke: I'm going to transfer you to someone else
So I explain the same thing to the new guy who thankfully (I thought at the time) is UK based.
New Bloke: "You might want to switch to a Talk Talk email address you know"
Me: "Why?"
New Bloke: "Well that domain's quite old you know"
Me:"So are my parents, and that's why we don't change things if at all possible. What does the age of the domain of the email address have to do with anything anyway?"
New Bloke: "Well you know.......it might get switched off due to its age. We can't support everything indefinitely."
Me: "How long have you worked in this job"
New Bloke: "A while"
Me: "Do you have any qualifications in anything IT related?"
New Bloke: "I'm not sure I'm allowed to answer questions like that"
Me: "Okay, can Talk Talk not afford to keep the payments up on the homechoice.co.uk domain? It's not really that expensive is it? My domain name is a .com and only costs ~£10 a year."
New Bloke: "I can't comment on the company or finances"
He didn't know the difference between a domain and a mail server as far as I can tell.
The folks used the Homechoice mail option because there were far fewer good free options back when they signed up. Also they were getting on a bit back then, fairly stubborn and chose to use that over my suggestions. Changing email addresses was problematic and annoyed the hell out of them.
Re: Begging for Trouble
Can't imagine why anyone ever used an ISP email account. Perhaps because that was what was available when the ISP for first used ~20 years ago, and it continues to work?
All I want is some place that lets me download via IMAP and send with SMTP.
This TalkTalk migration seems to be affecting all of their legacy domains. And whereas OneTel seems to have a valid SPF record after migrating, Pipex does not.
This follows on from Pipex having an invalid MX record earlier this year (it pointed to an Alias, which isn't allowed and some other ISPs refused to play ball as a result).
No doubt a result of lots of GUI admin tools, and hence less understanding of the underlying reality.
I still have an email address provided by talktalk
Luckily enough they don't seem to have worked out that I stopped paying for it 20 odd years ago. But then they bought the company that bought the company that bought the company that bought the company that supplied my original email so I guess that detail got lost along the way.
For free it's not a bad service. I have 20+ years worth of mail stored on there for nothing and when the password stops working, if you know the right people to contact, you can get a new one. I suspect there are some old techies there who are left alone because they're the only ones who know how it actually hangs together....
I had to abandon Onetel
When they stopped working with ISDN.
Then got a huge bill with ukonline.
Then I finally got Broadband, ended up on BT as I could see the smaller ISPs going down the toilet, and at the time quickest to put it in.
At least I missed the Dildo Hardin period.
super secure
That is some good verbiage... Super, really!
Re: super secure
...and considering who it is that's saying it, and what their frame of reference for "secure" is, it doesn't really count for very much does it?
Begging for Trouble
Can't imagine why anyone ever used an ISP email account.