NTL hit by email breakdown - MORE

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From ZNet UK

NTL hit by email breakdown
13:55 Wednesday 11th June 2003
Graeme Wearden

Users claim that NTL's email service hasn't worked properly since Friday. The company insists that only a tiny number of people have been affected, but won't go into details.

NTL has been hit by technical problems that are preventing some users from connecting to the company's email services.

According to the cable company, the fault is only sporadically affecting a very small proportion of its users. But several users have told ZDNet UK that the NTL email service has been close to unusable since last Friday.

NTL says it is working to remedy the issue, which it insists is not a major problem. It also says that it doesn't stop people from sending emails, just from downloading new messages they have received.

"It's an intermittent fault, affecting a tiny number of customers," an NTL spokesman told ZDNet UK on Wednesday. He declined to give precise details of the problem or to say how long it is likely to take before the service is resolved, but insisted that "a quick fix" is being implemented.

A number of NTL users, though, are angry about the lack of information that has been available about the problem.

"All attempts to contact NTL either get ignored, or you get a recorded message saying 'You may have trouble collecting email from one or more of your email addresses,' said one disgruntled reader. He added that when he tries to use NTL's Webmail service he encounters a delay of between five and ten minutes after logging on, and again when he attempts to open, reply to, or delete a message.

Another NTL user, Colin Hurrell, said he has had repeated problems with email since moving to NTL from BT at the end of March this year. "Since transferring to NTL, I have only had about two or three weeks where there have not been email server problems and I have made numerous complaints to your technical support team," wrote Hurrell, in a letter of complaint to NTL. "I now wish I had never left BT".

NTL said it will keep users informed about the condition of its email service through announcements posted on the NTL World Web site.

Are you an NTL user whose email account has been affected by these problems, or is the service working fine for you? Let us know.

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From The Register

NTL working on 'intermittent' email problem
By Tim Richardson
Posted: 11/06/2003 at 15:20 GMT

NTL claims it is working as "quickly as possible" to rectify an "intermittent" email problem that's dogged users since the weekend.

Punters claim this is just the latest issue in a long line of problems to hit the cableco. What's more, they're fed up.

Said one reader who contacted The Register: "I have been having intermittent problems with collecting e-mail over the last few months and enjoyed the wasted hours pointlessly running through the whole of my system with a toothcomb with an engineer to disprove this is anything to do with NTL.

"Lo and behold a post on their site on Monday to say they are having a problem with e-mail. I (and lots of others) haven't been able to collect e-mail for 4 days and a call to the engineer gives no projected fix date. Call this a service? I don't."

Anyhow, NTL says its engineers are working on the problem and adding new hardware but it's still unclear when NTL will resolve the problem.

A statement on NTL's site reads: "ntl:home internet customers on all packages may currently be unable to send email from their ntlworld accounts. Our engineers are aware of this issue and are working towards a resolution. Please accept our apologies for any inconvencience this may cause. ®

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From The Register

NTL promises to improve email service
By Tim Richardson
Posted: 16/06/2003 at 09:08 GMT

NTL is to increase its email capacity and remove unread emails in a bid to solve its long-running email problems.

Months of problems came to a head last week when NTL's service went belly-up, leaving punters without email for days on end.

In an email to punters today the cableco apologised for the "intermittent technical problems" that have left customers fuming.

Said the email: "As you may have noticed, ntlworld's email service has recently suffered some intermittent technical problems and some of our customers have been temporarily unable to retrieve their email. If you have suffered from any of these problems we'd like to offer you our sincere apologies and to explain a little more about our plan to fix this.

"Over the next few days we will be increasing the capacity of our email service and removing more of the large volume of unread emails that slows down the system.

"In particular, we will be changing the number of days we store unread email for to 90 days, in line with other leading ISPs. We will be making this change with effect from Monday 16th June.

"By making these changes and reducing the volume of unread emails stored on the service, we will significantly improve the quality of your email service," it said.

For NTL punters, the improvements can't come soon enough.

One reader told us: "This morning NTL delivered an email they'd been sitting on for five days. ****ed off or what." ®

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As explained on another thread - me and my buddy in Bournemouth have been hit badly by this 'minor' problem.
Currently I can receive - altho dozens of expected emails haven't arrived - but can't send out unless I go off line and come on again. And even then it sticks for ages.