unreliable e-mail

Am I alone in having the most unreliable e-mail service from TT? Senders have no idea that I am not receiving messages. However those I am sending are getting to their destinations pretty quickly. Incoming mail is a nightmare, some arrives 2-3 hours after being sent but others don't appear for up to a week and then there are those which don't appear at all.
I acknowledge that there are service problems with most broadband providers but I find it infuriating that there is no 'undeliverable' message returned to senders. I have missed out on a few meetings this week and people think I am going mad resending e-mails to them continually as I never get any replies.
Please can someone confirm that I am not going slowly mad and there is a problem?

stick_insect
I have experienced the problems you describe on many occasions. TalkTalk consistently and conveniently refuse to recognise that problems exist!
Someone sent me an email this morning at 08.58. It was received by TalkTalk less than a minute later having been forwarded by my email forwarding provider.
The email was eventually delivered at 22.30 ie. some 13 hours later.
I and several others have posted on this subject previously, specifically inviting TT to respond. However, someone from TT usually replies saying "everything is rosy at their end!"
The bottom line is that no TalkTalk customer can rely on their email service.
No you are not mad, but maybe it helps!
David

I have been sending a number of test e-mails to myself tonight, using my TT e-mail account.

First two bounced back saying "Unknown address error 550-'Unknown user'

How can mail be returned if the user... me, is unknown??

Another one has disappeared somewhere in an Opal server.

It surely can't be that difficult to set up a correctly working e-mail service, even Orange could manage that.

Brunel

Edited by Brunel (Fri 13-Apr-07 00:39:54)

thx for your replies. I'm glad to hear I've not gone completely mad yet, nor am I completely alone with my problems.
I have been testing the talk talk e-mail service myself. I've found from yahoo addresses the delivery times are appalling, 6hrs at best recently, but from one talk talk address to another delivery is much faster. Is it possible for other ISP's to deliberately hold back talktalk.net addresses to discredit the system more?
To resolve my issues I suppose I'll just need to open a google mail account and inform all my contacts again of the necessary change.

To end on a positive note I have been a 'lucky' TT customer with BB going live earlier than promised and a stable connection although speed is capped at the 2MB level.

The TT SMTP server is sending out the mail ok, it appears to be a POP problem.

Brunel

Just to confirm, the TT SMTP server is sending out mail within 1 sec.

It either never arrives at the TT POP server, or it bounces back as user unknown.

Several other non TT POP servers are picking up correctly.

Time for OPAL TELECOM to sort this problem.

Brunel

I have sent 20 e-mails from a G-Mail account web based, 4 arrived at my TT mail account within 5 mins.... the remainder...????

Brunel