Talktalk want £5 pcm for emails?

clive0510

HI. Talktalk were for a long time my broadband supplier. I changed that last year for a better deal with vodafone. I also had and still do have my email address with talktalk, who now tell me they want £5 pcm for the email service. so just wondering what are my options here? how easy will it be to change email suppliers? as you may know I'm no I.T. expert, so any help appreciated.

TadleyBaggie

Using an ISP supplied email address causes exactly these types of issues, especialy since ISP independant addresses are available for free. I got caught like this once and vowed never again.

So create a new free email address with someone else (e.g. Gmail, Outlook, GMX). You then have to log onto every website that uses the old ISP email address and change it to the new email address. It's a pain but only has to be done once.

flaneurs_lobster

There are plenty of free email options to swap to, Gmail and Outlook are popular.

Do you have a Google account (maybe on your mobile phone) or a Microsoft account on a Windows computer?

The harder bit is telling everyone that has your email address that you've moved. Much like moving house you need to email everyone you want to know, from your new address.

You can also put a "redirect" on your old email address that will forward your email to the new address - but for that you'll have to keep the old address for a while at a cost.

clive0510

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81955907#Comment_81955907

Thanks for the reply. To tell you the truth about 90% of my emails are just junk from people selling junk! so shall i just keep the ones I want and forget the rest? I guess if someone really needed to get in touch I have my landline phone or mobile.

flaneurs_lobster

As @TadleyBaggie says, the more pressing issue is any/all the websites where you've used your email address as your logon name (utilities, local council, government etc etc). They will all need to be notified of the change.

It will be much easier if you run your new email address alongside your old one for a few months, there will always be a contact or organisation that you've forgotten to notify.

Are your email contacts stored on the TalkTalk email system?

clive0510

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81955968#Comment_81955968

Yes they are all stored there. I do have a gmail account but never really bothered using it. so I've just been on there and playing around a bit. my gmail appears to be all fine, just unused! so as you say, I can now run the two together. but I'll only transfer over the ones I want. the rest is mostly rubbish.

flaneurs_lobster

You can download/upload your contacts from old to new if you want, depends how many you have if it's worthwhile.

There are ways of copying all your emails across but sounds like you don't want that.

Reading the Talktalk site it looks like you can use your email account (for free) until mid-June, then it goes read-only for a couple of weeks, then dies.

If you are happy enough using Gmail (on a PC?) then you could look at adding your Talktalk email address to it, it will access your account and copy the mails to Gmail until your access stops.

Settings, Accounts and Import, Check email from other accounts

clive0510

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81956148#Comment_81956148

yes thanks for that. new email (gmail) is working fine now, i just have to get used to it, I'm not that fussed really. its just handy to have.