IMAP stopped working

[#1]

Yes I noted the certificate errors, but clicking allow/accept it works, change to relay.plus.net and it works on outlook (using non PN fibre connection)

change to relay.plus.net on android device (using any mail client), get the same errors.

I wonder if Im not seeing the full extent of the error message on the android apps, so "incorrect username/password", isnt actually what it says on the tin (as I know username and password are correct).  Same for unable to establish a stable connection...

Ill leave it a while and try again later to see if ive upset any "try later" timeouts.

[#2]

Wrong username / passwords cover a lot of sins which are darned all to do with user name / password, especially when sending. Anything and everything which fails to establish a good SMTP connect gets reported by email clients as an authentication failure.

[#3]

Hey Chesterfield did you ever fix this problem? I've had the same issue since about November, my Android devices can't get inbox updates on a regular schedule (currently about 5 days behind) but iPhone and Windows are fine. Also it did start to work for a couple of days about a week ago (i didn't do any changes so nothing to do wityh my set up) but since it has stopped again.

Seems strange as this worked on my phone for about 4 years okay and then stopped working so I believe this has to be something PN has down at their end.

Thanks

[#4]

@rog 

Why if it works fine on your iPhone and your PC, but does not work on your android is this ...something PN has down their end?

Two devices work fine with the service, one does not ... is it not more likely to be the different client which is messed up?

"i didn't do any changes so nothing to do wityh my set up" - really?  So the android has not (quietly) done any updates?

It would help if you described exactly what is going wrong, rather than speculate on what might be wrong / has not changed.

1. Are the devices all looking at the same email account?
2. Are they all using the same email application (note Outlook on phones is not proper Outlook)
3. Are the settings identical? (IMAP / Server names / ports / user names etc)
4. Were they configured manually or where the clients left to guess at the connection settings?
5. Are they all connecting over your Plusnet broadband at home?

[#5]

Hi Townman, thanks for offering to help. Yes all connections are to the same plusnet account (username) and over the plusnet home broadband. All devices were working as expected up until about November 2022 when the two Android ones stopped receiving emails on schedule, delays of up to 2 or 3 days were common. Then a couple of weeks ago they started coming in okay but have since stopped all together.
Another point to note is that it is only Inbox that fails to update, sent, junk, drafts and deleted work correctly. Inbox has about 1000 emails. Also I have no outlook clients although I have an outlook email account using the same email clients and IMAP and this account updates just fine. I've had the PN account for over 15 years. All manually setup. Details of incoming settings:

iPhone iOS 15.5, iOS email client, mail.plus.net, no SSL, password authentication, port 110 (old value from long ago but works and I don't want to change it) POP3
Windows 11, Thunderbird client, imap.plus.net, SSL/TLS, password auth, port 993. works fine
Android 9 samsung phone, samsung email client, imap.plus.net, SSL, password auth, port 993 doesn't update inbox, but does sync correctly. Also used gmail client with same results. [and it doesn't update so no changes to the client or OS during this time]
Samsung tab S7 android 13, samsung email client, imap.plus.net, SSL, password auth, port 993 doesn't update inbox, but does sync correctly. And if I use a POP3 setup with this client it works okay.
To avoid reliance on samsung android email client I have also loaded FairEmail on the tablet, same settings for IMAP and same results. However this provides a debug log which shows when it syncs to the inbox you get a javax.mail.FolderClosedException: Lost connection to the server and later a javax.mail.StoreClosedException: NOOP INBOX. I have tried doubling the timeout on this account to 40 seconds

What's the next debug idea? Can you see any server-side errors that might shed light on what is wrong? Thanks

[#6]

Hi @rog 

Thank you the details really help.

1. Mixing POP3 and IMAP operations tends to lead to confusions - I would recommend avoiding doing that
2. iOS tends to enforce (certainly prefers) encryption - POP3 encryption is on port 995 with TLS/SSL

Yes the servers can time out rather too often - I would try setting the time out at 2 minutes

If the clients are connecting but not syncing the INBOX, try setting the root folder to INBOX.

I have seen various incomprehensible issues with various mail services (not just Plusnet's) where the sync of IMAP folders seems to go pear-shaped requiring the root folder to be specified.  I have email accounts with Plusnet and other providers where one mailbox requires the root folder to be specified, but another does not.  I have never found the cause of this, but I have a suspicion that Round Cube's webmail client has some bearing on the issue.

HTH?

[#7]

Hi @Townman 

Cool, interesting answers, thanks. Regarding POP3/IMAP mix I did suspect that originally and moved all accounts to IMAP and turned off the iPhone for a while. Didn't seem to help but will try again.

I have just done a big inbox delete as I realised it was over 1600 and this large delete is working through with a fair few time out errors 😁 (I did this on the windows laptop/thunderbird). I'll let this settle and see the results before I do more testing.

And I will look to tweak the timeouts up to 2mins and have a play with the root folder. Will update you in a few days.

Cheers!

[#8]

Culling mailbox contents

If you need to clean out your mailbox, may be because it is over quota, then as well as tidying up the inbox, you need to also look at the SENT ITEMS folder and then afterwards clear out the TRASH folder. However some times webmail performance can make this process very tedious, particularly if the delete action (actually a move to the trash folder) fails.

If you primarily want to delete emails, you can mitigate delete performance issues by doing an "immediate" delete (rather than a move to trash for deletion later) by holding down the SHIFT key when pressing the DEL key. This works in both webmail and most PC based email clients. WARNING SHIFT+DEL is not recoverable so be certain absolutely, that you do not need the email before pressing the buttons!

Alternatively, in webmail (Round Cube) Settings -> Server Settings there are some options worth exploring controlling how deletes are performed...

1. Flag the message for deletion instead of delete
2. If moving messages to "Deleted Items" fails, permanently delete them
3. Compact Inbox on logout

Setting these options and using them together will avoid the over heads of moving items to the trash folder when you wish to delete them. They will simply be greyed out and remain in the inbox list. After logging out of webmail, they will then be removed from the mailbox.

Whilst this might be highly proficient, it needs to be used with care, for when they are gone, they are gone. Note also that Plusnet house-keeping clears out the trash folder weekly.

[#9]

Hi Rog,

I fixed it in a fashion.   What I did in the end was subscribe to a family office 365 plan (kids are growing up fast so wont be long before they will be using it).  I have a domain name I wanted to use, and there is or was a workaround to be able to use your own domain on the office 365/outlook system.

So I set up outlook on my devices (including android), physically copied across all the mail I wanted to keep, and then just put email forwarders on for the addresses I use.  The rest just drops into the PN mailbox and I check it every now and then to see if anyone is emailing me on a PN address that I want to email me on my custome domain and I go and change the details.

example if netflix send me an email on my old PN email address, then Ive updated my netflix account to the correct email address.

So when I say "fixed", i did it in the ed by just moving away from PN for email - yet to migrate the wifes email, but that will go the same way.  Ultimately I think thats a better solution because then Im not wedded to my broadband provier for email too.

[#10]

Hi @chesterfield 

Thanks for the update. Agree with you about a non-broadband provider email. Sounds like a good setup you have.

Have a great week

Rog

[#11]

Hi @chesterfield 

Sorry for delay but it took a while to fix and prove the fix was working. The issue appears to be that the mailbox was too full. Your tips for deleting were helpful but the webmail interface could only delete a few messages at a time and then refused to show any messages in the inbox at all (despite a few hundred being their). The IMAP interface from Thunderbird with permanent delete did work but again only for maybe 20 at a time and then not too many times before giving it time to process the deletes. Hence it took a few days to delete the emails.

After that the emails appear to sync using IMAP fine, although I haven't swapped all the devices back to IMAP from POP3 which I need to do next.

Thanks for your help much appreciated.

Roger