E-mail Ports

Hi folks,

I was speaking to a friend last night who is looking to move from Tiscali to PlusNet, but wanted to know whether PlusNet bind all e-mail to their own mail ports like Tiscali do? Apparently, he has had problems getting e-mails to work through his mail client with Tiscali because they force all mail through their SMTP port. Does anyone know whether PlusNet do the same?

Cheers,
Marc.

Hi Marc,

It's not that all outgoing mail traffic is forced through the ISP's mail server, but rather that if you're on for example Tiscali and trying to use the Plusnet mail server to send mail the Plusnet mail server will recognise you're not a Plusnet customer and therefore refuse to relay the mail. The same would happen in reverse too (i.e. being on Plusnet and using Tiscali's relay server). This is a measure against SPAM more than anything else.

On the flip side, you can use the relay server for your current ISP no matter where you get your mail from - I get mail from gmail, plusnet and virgin and can send via Plusnet's relay server without any issues. The important thing is to use the outgoing server for whichever ISP you're connected with as that will prevent 'Relay not permitted' errors.

Hope that helps,

Edited by deleted (Fri 14-Aug-09 11:14:58)

Which external mail service does he use?

If the ISP blocks outgoing port 25, (the default setting for SMTP), which Tiscali certainly does, then your friend should be able to use one of the alternative ports that all decent mail hosts provide. Some such as mine provide two alternatives.

I have never heard of these other ports being blocked by any ISP.

I think you're answering the wrong question there Orbrey , although what you say is obviously correct.

Tiscali block outgoing port 25 to external SMTP servers from the customer's mail client. So do O2/Be. Non-savvy users therefore have to use the ISP's SMTP servers.

Edited by RobertoS (Fri 14-Aug-09 11:43:48)

I'll be honest - I never knew that. Interesting.

Thanks for the heads up, that will be very handy to know.

Can the OP therefore assume Plusnet don't block outgoing port 25? (Assuming that is what he meant?)

Hi guys,

thanks for the responses.

>>Assuming that is what he meant?

Yup, that's exactly what I meant, RobertoS.

>>Which external mail service does he use?

He uses an e-mail address hosted by 1&1 as part of my website package - the outgoing SMTP server is: auth.smtp.1and1.co.uk As far as I can tell from what he's told me (I haven't actually seen it) the settings he's using are correct (i.e. identical to mine, which work fine on Zen). We've tried changing the outgoing port to 587 (which 1and1 recommend), but it still fails. The general consensus when I asked about this on one of the other forums here suggested Tiscali are something of a pain for this kinda thing.

Cheers,
Marc.

I didn't know they blocked 587 as well. Though that is one of the common alternatives. Thanks .

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Can the OP therefore assume Plusnet don't block outgoing port 25? (Assuming that is what he meant?)

He can indeed. We don't block outgoing port 25.

Sounds like he may be advising the user to join you then.

I shall eagerly await your cheque.

Edited by RobertoS (Fri 14-Aug-09 13:18:00)