Unable to access email on phone or through webmail

[#1]

@Boris27 this has all the signs of either a true authentication issue OR a migrated account

We need to establish some basic facts :-

1) Can you confirm that you can login to the plusnet portal (www.plus.net/login) with the accountname & password that you believe is the correct one ?

If you can login, then when going to the 'manage my mail' link , do you see the mailboxes listed ?

2) Can you login to the Greenby portal ( www.greenby.com ) with the same credentials OR (as you said earlier you've changed the password ) with the previous password ?

3) Can you run the 2nd command in the diagnostics i.e curl -v smtp://relay.plus.net:587 -u username --ssl-reqd 

replacing username as before ( when posting the results make sure you redact the full email address and the encrypted authentication password ) 

[#2]

Hi MisterW

1 Yes I can log into Plusnet portal and can get to manage my mail. My email address is listed in mailbox.

2 No I cant log into Greenby with any of the passwords I have used in the past or the most recent one.

3 Will try that now

[#3]

TonysMao15Green:~ ******-MBP15-Blue$ curl -v smtp://relay.plus.net:587 -u *********.plus.com--ssl-reqd
Enter host password for user '********.plus.com--ssl-reqd':
* Host relay.plus.net:587 was resolved.
* IPv6: (none)
* IPv4: 212.159.9.107, 212.159.8.107
* Trying 212.159.9.107:587...
* Connected to relay.plus.net (212.159.9.107) port 587
< 220 avasout-ptp-003 smtp relay.plus.net
> EHLO TonysMao15Green
< 250-avasout-ptp-003 hello [81.154.90.139], pleased to meet you
< 250-HELP
< 250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
< 250-SIZE 104857600
< 250-PIPELINING
< 250-8BITMIME
< 250-STARTTLS
< 250 OK
> AUTH PLAIN
< <removed>
< 535 ...authentication rejected
* Closing connection
curl: (67) Login denied

Moderator's note:
Personal information removed from a public forum (to an area that staff can see).

[#4]

@Boris27 

sorry but can you try that again please, you've got a space missing before the --ssl-reqd , so its taking the whole string including the --ssl-reqd as the username.

In addition can you also repeat the command but using the same username (i.e just the accountname) & password that works to login to the Plusnet portal 

[#5]

Sorry about that - this is the result I get when entering with the correct space and with just the user name - (redacted).

TonysMao15Green:~ tonyyates-MBP15-Blue$ curl -v smtp://relay.plus.net:587 -u ******* --ssl-reqd
Enter host password for user '******':
* Host relay.plus.net:587 was resolved.
* IPv6: (none)
* IPv4: 212.159.9.107, 212.159.8.107
* Trying 212.159.9.107:587...
* Connected to relay.plus.net (212.159.9.107) port 587
< 220 avasout-ptp-002 smtp relay.plus.net
> EHLO TonysMao15Green
< 250-avasout-ptp-002 hello [81.154.90.139], pleased to meet you
< 250-HELP
< 250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
< 250-SIZE 104857600
< 250-PIPELINING
< 250-8BITMIME
< 250-STARTTLS
< 250 OK
> STARTTLS
< 220 Ready to start TLS
* (304) (OUT), TLS handshake, Client hello (1):
* CAfile: /etc/ssl/cert.pem
* CApath: none
* (304) (IN), TLS handshake, Server hello (2):
* TLSv1.2 (IN), TLS handshake, Certificate (11):
* TLSv1.2 (IN), TLS handshake, Server key exchange (12):
* TLSv1.2 (IN), TLS handshake, Server finished (14):
* TLSv1.2 (OUT), TLS handshake, Client key exchange (16):
* TLSv1.2 (OUT), TLS change cipher, Change cipher spec (1):
* TLSv1.2 (OUT), TLS handshake, Finished (20):
* TLSv1.2 (IN), TLS change cipher, Change cipher spec (1):
* TLSv1.2 (IN), TLS handshake, Finished (20):
* SSL connection using TLSv1.2 / ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 / [blank] / UNDEF
* Server certificate:
* subject: jurisdictionCountryName=GB; businessCategory=Private Organization; serialNumber=03279013; C=GB; L=Sheffield; O=Plusnet plc; CN=relay.plus.net
* start date: Aug 15 00:00:00 2025 GMT
* expire date: Aug 14 23:59:59 2026 GMT
* subjectAltName: host "relay.plus.net" matched cert's "relay.plus.net"
* issuer: C=US; O=DigiCert Inc; CN=GeoTrust EV RSA CA G2
* SSL certificate verify ok.
> EHLO TonysMao15Green
< 250-avasout-ptp-002 hello [81.154.90.139], pleased to meet you
< 250-HELP
< 250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
< 250-SIZE 104857600
< 250-PIPELINING
< 250-8BITMIME
< 250 OK
> AUTH PLAIN
< 334
> AHlhdGVzMjcAQmF0aHRpbWUyNyE=
< 235 ... authentication succeeded
> HELP
< 214-This is smtp ESMTP service help
214-This is smtp ESMTP service help
< 214-To contact postmaster send email to postmaster@plus.com.
214-To contact postmaster send email to postmaster@plus.com.
< 214-For local information send email to Postmaster at your site.
214-For local information send email to Postmaster at your site.
< 214 end of HELP info
214 end of HELP info
* Connection #0 to host relay.plus.net left intact

[#6]

@Boris27 so it looks like the password you are using for the tony@<account>.plus.com is incorrect.

This is based on:-

You can login to the Plusnet imap server using callnet.uk , this will be a direct connection to the Plusnet server from an on-network IP address and therefore wont check authentication credentials

You can not login to imap.plus.net , this goes via the Greenby proxy and so will require correct credentials

Is tony@<account>.plus.com your primary (only) mailbox or is it a secondary one ?

If its the primary one, then try using just accountname & password on your phone as the credentials, same for webmail. 

If its a secondary one, then login to the Plusnet portal and change the password for the tony mailbox and then try the phone & webmail again with the new password 

[#7]

Thanks for bearing with me.

Yeah its my primary (only) email address with plusnet. I have always logged in as User name (account name) and password whether its for plusnet or plusnet webmail. Ive also tried full email address and password neither get me into webmail. Ill try setting up plusnet mail on my phone again as I deleted it in case it was interfering with webmail.

[#8]

Yeah can’t set up mailbox again on my phone - server doesn’t respond to my details - as I’ve tried every password I’ve ever used over the years it definitely looks like my password has somehow been changed to one I don’t know. I suppose that’s game over as regards access.

[#9]

The password for the primary mailbox is the same as the account password. We've proved that is correct because you can login to the Plusnet portal with it.

I've got one more try, use the full email address  instead of just account name , although both should work!

If that doesn't work then I'm afraid I'm out of ideas...

[#10]

Yes I tried that but no luck I’m afraid.
Thanks so much for your help and guidance - in the end it’s one of those head scratchers that has beaten me.

[#11]

I really dont know what the problem is although it seems to be the Greenby proxy. The imap.plus.net url routes through the proxy and doesnt accept your creds, whereas (it would appear) mail.callnetuk.com routes direct to the PN servers and does. The downside is that (i dont think?) callnet supports ssl.

If you are happy without ssl encryption then you could try setting your client to use mail.callnetuk.com port 143 as the incoming server and relay.plus.net as the outgoing. Use accountname & password as the creds as both of those seems to work with those servers.

edit: beware though!, the above will stop working as and when your account gets migrated to Greenby

[#12 · Accepted solution]

So I finally found out what the problem was - as a last resort I thought I would try to log onto Greenby - which always said user not recognised whatever password I tried - but this time I would go via the forgot password link - I kept my plusnet user name and changed my password (to the one I have with plusnet - who knows what the Greenby one was !) and hey presto it logged me into my webmail.
So just over a month ago I was migrated to Greenby and no one informed me of this ! - now 30 days has passed and they have frozen my email account and are asking for a subscription to reopen it - but at least I can see webmail up to the point it was frozen.
Thanks so much to MisterW for all your patient help - I’ve learnt a lot and you are a star ⭐

[#13]

@Boris27 

So just over a month ago I was migrated to Greenby and no one informed me of this ! - now 30 days has passed and they have frozen my email account and are asking for a subscription to reopen it - but at least I can see webmail up to the point it was frozen.

Do you not have a Plusnet broadband account then ? 

with a broadband account you should get 2 yrs free with Greenby!

[#14]

No I havent got Plusnet broadband now - Many years ago I had my broadband and email through Plusnet but had to change when we got FTTP and at that time plusnet couldnt provide for FTTP. I was however able to keep my email address. 

[#15]

Therefore, @Boris27 , you had 30 days from the migration  date to pay to retain it, or you lost it.