Cannot send Plusnet emails via Webmail

[#1]

I access my emails via Webmail and since early this year I have been unable to send emails. I can receive them. My untechnical assumption is that there is something wrong with the outgoing server settings and I want to access them to see if they are correct. I do know what they are supposed to be.

On the Webmail inbox page if you click on the Settings icon on the top right hand side it brings up seven Preferences including Server Settings. If you click on Server Settings two sections appear namely Main Options and Maintenance. The actual incoming and outgoing settings are nowhere to be seen.

I don't know if it helps but when I try to send an email the following error message comes up -

"Requested action not taken ; mailbox unavailable"

followed by a series of numbers and letters then

" sender domain rejected (blacklisted by local policy)"

[#2]

Webmail - accessing email via a browser here https://webmail.plus.net - does not need any setting details.  Are you referring to something else?

Also which email brand?

A series of numbers and letters are key information when seeking help.

[#3]

Hello Townman,

Thank you for your very prompt reply. Unfortunately I do not understand some of the 3 points you raised. However I will try and answer them as follows -

(1) Webmail settings - I wanted to check my outgoing settings to see if they are what they were supposed to be because I assumed that is where the problem lay. I tried to do this via the Settings icon but failed. 

(2) Email brand - I don't understand this - at the moment my internet and email provider is Plusnet.

(3)Series of numbers and letters - I am sorry but I cannot now supply this. When I try and send an email now I don't get any response at all. I know it has been sent but I am not told that it has failed.

A further issue that may interest you is that some emails I receive seem to take an age to enter my inbox.

[#4]

There are no server connection settings to configure or check if using the webmail (the web browser email client).  If you think you need to check / change settings, then you are not using webmail, but something else.  That might be something entirely different.

Plusnet supply lots of email brands - MAAF, IC24, Forec9, Free-online ...etc . which are you using?

[#5]

Townman,

Thanks again for your comments. It's always comforting to know that someone is in your corner trying to help you. I have been computing for some time but always struggle to solve technical issues when they arise including understanding the jargon that frequently arises. My initial thought that I could access my server settings via the Settings icon on the Webmail page seems misplaced.

In regard to the email brands you mentioned none of them is familiar to me. They were certainly not mentioned in the initial Plusnet setup paperwork in 2016/17. However, I have been online and found the following statement in one of their guides which comes after a list of suggested computer settings -

" If you've been with us a while your domain might be 'force9.co.uk' or 'free-online.net'. If so change 'plus.net' to 'force9.co.uk' or 'free-online.net' for both incoming and outgoing servers"

When I first encountered the problem of sending emails I went online and soon discovered that i was not alone. Loads of people had the same thing. Lots of advice in solving it but little evidence that the solutions worked. In some cases users went direct to Plusnet rather than the Community and left empty handed. A very poor state of affairs for such an apparently common problem. The reported move by Plusnet to Greenby in November is presumably to address such matters at an additional cost to users.

I normally like to try and solve issues by myself and the way things are going at the moment it seems beyond me. I end with a quote by Lawrence Oates to Captain Scott of the Antarctic expedition " I am going out and I may be some time".

[#6]

No the move to Greenby is not to sole theses problems and is initially at the cost of Plusnet, where a user has a current broadband account.

To help you further you need to provide objective information please...

• What are you using to access email?
• What email service are you using - which of those you mention is yours?
• What is the exact error message?

If it is @youraccount.plus.com then that has not been moved to Greenby (as yet).

[#7]

Townman,

You have asked me 4 questions which I will endeavour to answer as best as I can -

(1) What are you using to access emails.?

I access emails via Plusnet Webmail although you seem to question it. When I click on it, the 'Welcome to Webmail' login box appears with the username/password/server already filled in. The server box has 'Plusnet' in it but also has a drop down menu which includes Force9/Freeonline/Metranet. They mean nothing to me until you raised it earlier.

When I click on Login it opens up my inbox with all the incoming emails including your own responses to my problem.

(2) What email service are you using.?

I have always presumed that my service provider is Plusnet. My existing email address is in the form of  'forename@username.plus.com' and I have had it since 2016.

(3) Which of those you mention is yours.?

I don't know what you mean by this.

(4) What is the exact error message.?

I cannot provide this because I binned it earlier and it no longer resides in my deleted items box. I have a few emails in my sent box. I know they have been sent but I also know that they were never received by the recipient because I have tested it. I no longer receive notification that there has been an error.

[#8]

---

@TikkiTTavi wrote:

I access my emails via Webmail and since early this year I have been unable to send emails. I can receive them. My untechnical assumption is that there is something wrong with the outgoing server settings and I want to access them to see if they are correct.

---

OK back to the original question which inferred the potential confusions.

1. "webmail" is an often a poorly used term, to describe "email" - it has the very specific meaning of a web browser based email client to access an email service, but is too often used to mean the email service in general however accessed
2. The webmail client does not have any outgoing server settings to modify - a PC or device based email client does
3. Plusnet supply about 11 different email brands; their means of access and the required settings are markedly different and must be factored into remedial advice

In your case:

• You really are using the webmail browser, so there will be no server settings to inspect or modify
• You are using a you@youraccount.plus.com email address and select "Plusnet" (the default setting) from the drop down options
• Inbound emails can be seen but might take an age (4+ hours?) to appear
• Sending email give rise to an unrecorded error message - where in a red box at the top of the screen?
• You have had this issue for months, but has only just raised it

Of very recent times "blacklisted by local policy" has been associated with users abusing the email service by one means or another, intentionally or unknown due to the presence of malware / the absence of effective protection tools (anti virus and anti) OR the spoofing of the email address.

Do you access the mailbox using any other means - for example on a PC?

Does your email address appear here - haveibeenpwned.com

It would be wise to change your accounts password and have your account checked as per the recent spate of issues...

Sender Domain Rejected (black listed by local policy)

This issue can report as server error 550. It typically arises where a user's email address has been abused for the purposes of sending spam emails. It has nothing to do with server settings etc.

This requires intervention by staff to determine the cause of the problem and to issue advice to check your system for viruses and malware. Only after your system(s) have been affirmed to be clean can the black listing be lifted. As a precaution, you should change the password on the affected email address.

Add your details to this thread - Cannot Send Emails and send a PM to @Leanne_T

[#9]

Townman,

Yesterdays response from you contained certain issues that made me think that I may know why I have had, or contributed to, the problem of sending emails. I will need some time to check my facts before putting them in print but I will report back by the weekend. In the meantime I would like to address some of the points/questions you raised. They are roughly in the order that you presented them -

(1) My reference to server settings was an untechnical assumption that they caused the problem. i accept that this is wrong.

(2) Some emails do seem to take a long time to appear in my inbox. It is certainly more than 4 hours and can be at least a day It is difficult to be precise about it because I am not at my computer every day. Your own responses have been pretty quick.. 

(3) When I send an email I would sometimes get a response that it had not been delivered. That does not happen now. I am not sure about the red box you refer to.

(4) I have had this issue since around January this year but never reported it because I wanted to try and solve it myself. It was an inconvenience that I could overcome and I let it slip. The recent proposal of the Plusnet move to Greenby prompted me to try and sort it out before that happened.

(5 I only access emails via my desktop computer.

(6) My email address does not appear on haveibeenpwned.com.

(7) I will change my password as recommended.

[#10]

@TikkiTTavi 

Shout when you need help ... we are now on the same page.  Too many times, one can end up offering the wrong advice out of taking verbatim what users write.

There is an intermittent issue in processing some inbound mail - it under investigation.

There are various stages of non-delivery

• Immediate - the outbound server has an issue with something - either itself or the sending account
• Short delay non-delivery - the receiving sever has an immediate issue with either the addressee or the sending service
• Long delay non-delivery - the receiving server repeated deferred receipt - was seen a great deal with gmail addressees

[#11]

Townman,

I promised to get back to you about my theory as to how the sending problem may have developed.

When I first started with Plusnet email I had direct access to it via my computer. It worked well for years and I had no experience of Plusnet Webmail at that time.

Around December 2024 I started to get messages from Microsoft hinting that the world might end if I did not link my Plusnet account to Microsoft New Outlook. I have never had an Outlook account but I opened one anyway about mid January this year. It works fine.

The next stage in the exercise was to establish that link and this is where I think the problem may have developed. Despite many attempts over days and weeks I have never managed to do it. On one particular session I received a warning from Plusnet that there was suspicious activity on my account and it was to be shut down for 24 hours. Unfortunately the suspicious activist was me blundering about in the unknown. I obtained access some time later. Could it all be my fault and I have unintentionally caused it by my actions.?

After that failure I had access to my Plusnet emails via Webmail and then experienced the sending problem.

As a final point I changed my password yesterday 30 Oct and now find that I can no longer login. I have lost access to my emails. The error message is 'Connection dropped by IMAP server.

[#12]

Looking at the history the Microsoft / Outlook warnings about access to your Plusnet mailbox seems suspicious.

As for your current situation, try using the email server connection diagnostics to find the exact error message.  See the link below.

As for resetting passwords …

Reset email password

If you are not able to login to the email address using webmail, then it is likely that your email address has been identified as being compromised and has had its password changed. Where email address passwords have been changed to protect the integrity of the service, the Plusnet account password is left unchanged.

Which ISP are you with, Plusnet or one of the other / legacy vISPs?

Plusnet / Force9 / FreeOnline users can only change the password on the DEFAULT email address by changing the password on the user ACCOUNT through the user portal. You can change the password on a secondary mailbox using the Manage My Mail options in the user portal.

Brightview users (Madasafish / FreeNetName / GlobalNet / IC24 / ICScotland / Dialstart / Totalise) logging into webmail should use their full email address. Use the MAAF user portal to update the password on the default email address (change the account password) and use this MAAF guide to change the password on a secondary mailbox address. If you cannot recall the account password, you will need to contact support ... because the account password change process sends an email to the mailbox you cannot now access.

DO NOT USE THE SAME PASSWORD AGAIN for that would allow the continued exploitation of the account. The new password should be cryptic and not one used before.

Note that changing the account password will change the password used for logging on to the relevant user portal. If your email service is NOT a retained legacy service (one associated with a retired internet service account), then the password required by the router to connect to the internet will be changed too. If the router is a Hub Zero or a Hub One supplied by Plusnet it should update automatically. If not, you will need to log into the router, drop the connection, change the password yourself and reconnect.

On the assumption that the email address password has been compromised, I strongly recommend that wherever you have used that email address / password combination as access credentials to services such as Amazon, Netflix, eBay etc., that you also change the passwords on those service as well.

[#13]

@TikkiTTavi 

After that failure I had access to my Plusnet emails via Webmail and then experienced the sending problem.

As a final point I changed my password yesterday 30 Oct and now find that I can no longer login. I have lost access to my emails. The error message is 'Connection dropped by IMAP server.

With regards the underlined error message above ^, are you seeing this using https://webmail.plus.net/ ?

Are you by chance selecting 'Basic webmail'?  You should not be selecting this option you should use 'Login' found below the Server dropdown.

[#14]

Townman,

(1) The Microsoft/Outlook warning was a  one-off event which occurred on one particular day when I was trying to link Plusnet to New Outlook. My theory is that it was this that caused, or contributed to, my current situation. I had been trying several variations at one time which probably led to the belief that it was malicious or suspicious.

(2) I have had a look at the 'Email diagnostics' you mentioned. It is very well structured but I'm afraid that I do not know where to begin to do what you suggest.

(3) Resetting email password.. This seems to include much of what we have already discussed. I changed my password via the Member Centre and then got the error message about being dropped by the IMAP server. My change was unacceptable for whatever reason. When I tried to login to the Member Centre today 2 Nov a window opened with the heading " Oops. Your email address or password is incorrect". Below that heading is my email address, which is correct, and my changed password which is also correct. I am mystified.

Dan the Van,

Welcome to the discussion. You have asked me 2 questions

(a) Underlined error message. This message appeared on the Plusnet Member Centre  site immediately after I had changed my password. I had logged into it then Manage Account/Manage my email/ Change Password. The message did not appear again when I tried to log in a second time immediately after.

(b) Selecting basic webmail. I have never used this. The server window you displayed is the one that I am familiar with. The current password window contains a number of asterisks which are in accord with the number in my changed password.

[#15]

@Leanne_T - can you get someone to engage direct with the user please.