Tesco.net - email warning

angie54321

A warning about leaving Tesco broadband -

I am a previous tesco broadband user, and had been for over 2 years, even though their price (£17.99/month) was far higher than some of their competitors.

A few months ago I moved over to Talk Talk, and although I couldn't send emails via Tesco I could receive them.

During an online bank account spring clean a few weeks ago, I cancelled the Tesco direct debit, as it was no longer used.

Tesco have now, without any warning, cancelled my and my families entire email accounts. We cannot receive any emails sent since midnight, and cannot access any emails received before (luckily I download them to Outlook, but my son doesn't - he has lost everything).

I can understand them cancelling the email account (although nobody else I have ever used have - I still have lineone.net and telco4u.net email addresses, even though they don't exist anymore!) - but it would have been nice to have some sort of warning - an email or a letter.

So be warned - if you have or are going to move from Tesco in the near future, before you cancel your direct debit, get yourself a new email address and download any important email addresses to your computer!

As you can imagine, I am fuming - :mad: - their helpline just verbally shrugged and told me it was in the terms and conditions (the ones I received and read 3 years ago!). I apologised for not memorising them, but I have had other terms and conditions to memorise since then!:D

dmg24

This is quite standard.

Surely you gave yourself notice when you cancelled the direct debit?

DatabaseError

it does seem pretty strange to expect a service to continue after you've stopped paying for it. there are plenty of companies offering free e-mail, i'm fairly sure tesco aren't one of them.

the lesson (hopefully) learned is either get yourself a free email account(gmail, yahoo etc.) or buy a domain (~4/year) so you can have sonsname@mydomain.co.uk and mumsname@mydomain.co.uk etc.

speranza

It's a bit silly to use your ISP's email in my opinion. They're not usually that good (most ISPs don't invest a lot in their email service and they tend to remain undeveloped because there's little financial incentive for the ISP to add or improve features) and, of course, you have the problem of having to set up a whole new address when you leave. In this case, Tesco haven't done anything wrong as it was up to you to make alternative arrangements.

Definitely go with Googlemail.

angie54321

tonyhague wrote: »

it does seem pretty strange to expect a service to continue after you've stopped paying for it. there are plenty of companies offering free e-mail, i'm fairly sure tesco aren't one of them.

the lesson (hopefully) learned is either get yourself a free email account(gmail, yahoo etc.) or buy a domain (~4/year) so you can have [EMAIL="sonsname@mydomain.co.uk"]sonsname@mydomain.co.uk[/EMAIL] and [EMAIL="mumsname@mydomain.co.uk"]mumsname@mydomain.co.uk[/EMAIL] etc.

Many isps DO allow you to carry on using the email address - as I said in the original posting I still have (working) lineone and telco4u email addresses. From years ago. I haven't had a direct debit set up with either company for over 3 years.

My argument (as I also stated above) was not really that they severed the service - but they gave no warning that my email accounts would be closed - surely a standard email is not too much to ask for? As a courtesy? Customer care, and all that rubbish (and yes, I know technically I am no longer a customer, but I may return to them as far as they know - and I also buy grocery shopping, use their credit card etc.

And yes, luckily I have other email addresses - unfortunately my son only has the one (sorry, had the one). And I also have a domain name, with my own email address. It's a minor irritation to me, a major one to my son who uses his university computers to check his email.

angie54321

dmg24 wrote: »

This is quite standard.

Surely you gave yourself notice when you cancelled the direct debit?

Well, I actually cancelled the broadband and direct debit for £17.99 5 months ago. The direct debit remained open on my bank account, unused. Surely it makes sense for everyone to cancel unused direct debits?

All I have suggested is that it would be nice of Tescos to warn people. Not too much to ask for, in these days of automated emails, is it?

angie54321

speranza wrote: »

It's a bit silly to use your ISP's email in my opinion. They're not usually that good (most ISPs don't invest a lot in their email service and they tend to remain undeveloped because there's little financial incentive for the ISP to add or improve features) and, of course, you have the problem of having to set up a whole new address when you leave. In this case, Tesco haven't done anything wrong as it was up to you to make alternative arrangements.

Definitely go with Googlemail.

I already have a gmail account, (and am very happy with it) and a domain name account, so I have saved myself a lot of hassle, and use Outlook, so my emails are downloaded to my computer. Unfortunately my son who relies on university computers cannot download his emails as easily.

All I am asking for is Tesco's to have the courtesy to send an automated email to warn people what will happen. Tesco customer service centre thinks that is too much to ask though.

penrhyn

From their T&Cs it says:

8. STORAGE OF EMAIL AND WEBSITES You are responsible for checking your email regularly and storing any emails you wish to keep. Any emails kept on our servers will automatically be deleted after 120 days for read and unread messages. Mailboxes left dormant for 180 days will be closed and emails within deleted. The mailbox will only be reactivated by contacting the Call Centre.
Your mailbox is limited to 50mb.
If your mailbox exceeds 50mb any emails causing the mailbox to exceed this limit will be deleted.
When you reach the 50mb limit your mailbox is full. You will be unable to receive any more emails, and you will also be unable to save copies of emails that you send out.
You must keep your own back-up copies of your website and emails. We do not keep back-up copies of your website or emails and will not be liable for any loss or damage to them, however caused.

On a practical note it may be possible to reactivate your e-mail account by signing up for a basic dial up service. You would be able to access it via the broadband connection.

Tesco are not alone in this, Orange generally deactivate dormant mail accounts after 12 weeks.

angie54321

penrhyn wrote: »

From their T&Cs it says:

8. STORAGE OF EMAIL AND WEBSITES You are responsible for checking your email regularly and storing any emails you wish to keep. Any emails kept on our servers will automatically be deleted after 120 days for read and unread messages. Mailboxes left dormant for 180 days will be closed and emails within deleted. The mailbox will only be reactivated by contacting the Call Centre.
Your mailbox is limited to 50mb.
If your mailbox exceeds 50mb any emails causing the mailbox to exceed this limit will be deleted.
When you reach the 50mb limit your mailbox is full. You will be unable to receive any more emails, and you will also be unable to save copies of emails that you send out.
You must keep your own back-up copies of your website and emails. We do not keep back-up copies of your website or emails and will not be liable for any loss or damage to them, however caused.

On a practical note it may be possible to reactivate your e-mail account by signing up for a basic dial up service. You would be able to access it via the broadband connection.

Tesco are not alone in this, Orange generally deactivate dormant mail accounts after 12 weeks.

It appears to be something to do with me cancelling the dormant direct debit. Up until 2 days ago we all received regular emails from our tesco.net address, so the account was never dormant. Even though we have been on talk talk for the last 4 or so months.

I guess I just presumed (wrongly, I find out now!) that because I had been allowed to keep the email addresses of the other 2 internet providers I had previously used, and use them to receive emails, it would be the same rule with Tescos.

We live and learn- one thing I can say - there is a hell of a lot less spam in my inbox today! There's always a bright side!:j