Thunderbird trying to connect to mail.plus.net keeps timing out

[#1]

Haven't received any e-mails via Plusnet since early this morning, although they are all there on webmail.  Had a webchat with Plusnet earlier: was first referred to the basic webpages regarding e-mail, but we've been with Plusnet for over 3 years and using the Internet for over 20 years so it was little use.  It was then suggested that it must be Thunderbird which was the problem - how can you gainsay that when you really don't know?  However, we subsequently tried to Get Messages again and realised that Thunderbird was connecting with aol.com with no problem (some old e-mail addresses, previous to our move to Plusnet).  We therefore think it's nothing to do with Thunderbird, but don't know how to proceed: have checked our settings with Thunderbird and none appear to have become corrupted, so it isn't that.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

[#2]

Hi @sm1 - It's not just you, it appears the PN mailservers have a problem - I have reported to PN

[#3]

Thanks, John - but it makes me wonder why I had the pointless webchat at lunchtime?  As the last e-mail I'd received was five hours beforehand, they must have already known they had a problem.

[#4]

@sm1 - it appears from my 'Mailwasher' logs this has been an intermittent problem, but if it isn't reported by a number of people, it can appear to 'just be you'

[#5]

Same here, but it's intermittent. Seems to be similar to many reports over the last few weeks including this one I posted some time ago..   never did get a "we're working on it" response. 

https://community.plus.net/t5/Email/Collecting-emails-very-slow-sometimes-server-unavailable/td-p/15...

[#6]

That would explain why there's been so many failures, on and off, to connect with aol.com in the last couple of weeks - not quite so important, as there's usually only the odd mail from friends who've forgotten to delete our old e-mail from their address book.

[#7]

This problem will be associated with that acknowledged here https://community.plus.net/t5/Email/IMAP-server-down/m-p/1528864#M23204. Different protocol but same cluster of servers.

[#8]

Just tried our e-mail again and it's working - thankyou all for the useful information we've gleaned.

Mention has been made of reporting the problem, but I can't see anywhere on the Plusnet website to do this - other than on the forum, that is.  Am I looking in the wrong places?

[#9]

@sm1 - Yep, it appears to be working correctly at the moment, but I'll be keepimg my beady eye on Mailwashers' error log.

As regards reporting the problem (as I did) you need to ring PlusNet support on 0800 432 0200 or report it on the forum as you have done. If you ring in, you have to hope you get a clued-up agent, and be very clear in what you report, I spent 20 years (almost) working in IT support so fortunately can cut through guff, but I don't expect eveyone to have the same experience.

[#10]

Thanks, John: we both worked with computers for years (wife was a programmer on mainframes) but not sure we could convince Support on the 'phone!  Will stick to posting on the forum, I think.

[#11]

Posts on the email forum have the advantage of illustrating that a problem is affecting a number of users. That isn't necessarily obvious from isolated calls which might be handled by different agents. When calling reference to posts here helps to broaden the scope and get it escalated.

However when posting please don't add to a topic where the last post was ages ago (albeit slow webmail being the exception  ). As was done today a new topic commands more attention.

[#12]

Thanks for that @spraxyt. When I called, I did reference both this and the recent IMAP thread, but fortunately the agent I spoke to was clued-up - and had just received 3 three calls on the subject in the half hour he had been on duty,