Orange email problem hopefully solved

"You get what you pay for”, as my old Mum used to say, is certainly true of those supposedly-free broadband services provided as part of a telephone or television package.

Recently, I was asked to investigate an Orange email problem which had persisted for several weeks—essentially, the user was unable to send email though the incoming service was fine.

Several time-consuming calls to the Orange help-desk had not improved matters though my client is now an expert on the art of fruitless faffing with email and internet settings.

Being unable to resolve the issue immediately, I checked with another Orange user who had precisely the same problem though he occasionally succeeded by setting his Outlook email client to ‘send and receive’ every five minutes. 

A quick search of the internet using terms such as 'Orange email problems' revealed dozens of people with similar difficulties

I also discovered an excellent web site dedicated entirely to Orange service issues— www.orangeproblems.co.uk 

Quite clearly, the Orange servers were not coping with the volume of email generated by the lure of ‘free broadband’ though sporadic success can create a false impression that some of the 'try this and try that' advice provided by the Orange help-desk actually works.

Provided that the email service has previously worked and no changes made, there is little to be gained by messing about with settings, re-installing software or changing your email client.

Fortunately, I discovered a workable solution advertised on the Orange Problems site—for an entry-level fee of £14 per annum, www.authsmtp.com provide an outgoing mail server which is independent of any Internet Service Provider.

This is also handy for ‘mobile’ lap-top users who generally have difficulties when using the outgoing email server of one ISP with the internet-connection of another.

For Orange users, It may seem galling to pay for a service which you should already have but this small investment solved the problem 'instantly'

Setup instructions were very clear and the service was fully operational in a couple of minutes.

Give it a try—Authsmtp do offer a 'money back’ guarantee.

Comments

[Father Brian]

I've never heard anything good said about any Orange service, phone or internet.

The future may be bright but it's certainly not Orange!