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scotth67's profile

Teacher

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5 Messages

Saturday, September 15th, 2018 10:39 PM

What changed to cause Outlook 2016 to quit sending and receiving?

I have used Outlook (currently on 2016 version) for years. Periodically, something changes that causes Outlook to have problems with Bellsouth mail. I have the settings correct according to what I have read on AT&T pages, but I can no longer send or receive email through Outlook. Webmail works fine. What has changed? What can I do to resolve this?

Accepted Solution

Official Solution

Teacher

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5 Messages

6 years ago

I was finally able to create a secure key for my email on the AT&T site. That seems to have resolved the problem.

Accepted Solution

Official Solution

Teacher

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5 Messages

5 years ago

I made this change and had email working again in Outlook 2016 for about a
week. Then it went back to not sending or receiving. So, what changed? I
know I changed nothing on my end. That leaves AT&T as the only other option.
Who knows what changed there.

To get things working again, I had to create yet another secure mail key.
Once I did that and replaced the previous secure mail key that was only a
week old, mail began to send and receive as normal.

If this happens again, I'll create another secure mail key. However, it is
getting old doing this more than once.

Accepted Solution

Official Solution

Teacher

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5 Messages

4 years ago

While many online posts say to go into the settings in Outlook, mail
settings for Outlook are found in Mail Settings in the Control Panel. In
Windows 10, you can access the Control Panel by typing "Control Panel" after
clicking on the Start button (Windows button). From there, click on the
Control Panel app in the list and then click on Mail. From there, you can
delete your Outlook mail account and then create another one.

Community Support

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230.7K Messages

6 years ago

Hi @scotth67,

Let's get you back to sending and receiving emails like a pro! Check out our troubleshoot and resolve tool to repair and update your email.

Dee, AT&T Community Specialist

Teacher

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5 Messages

6 years ago

Nothing changed on my end, so that is the reason for asking what changed to
cause Outlook to quit sending and receiving. Since I posted the question,
AT&T email started coming through and came through all of the day on
9/16/18. However, today, 9/17/18, emails no longer are coming in or going
out. I keep getting a notice that indicates I need to enter my password.
However, as stated earlier, nothing was changed on my end, so I fail to see
why I need to attempt the troubleshooter. I have to say this as well:
Troubleshooting only works for those who are still paying customers. I'm
simply using the free email that I kept after switching ISP's. I kept the
Bellsouth email because I thought I might switch back at some point.

Community Support

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230.7K Messages

6 years ago

Hello @scotth67

 

We're glad to see you got it figured out! If you need help with anything else going forward, just let us know!

 

Aminah, AT&T Community Specialist

Contributor

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2 Messages

5 years ago

Outlook 2016 and Bellsouth.net Email (Solution?)

 

Having has a couple of frustrating weeks, I thought I would document what worked for me with the hope that it may work for others.

 

After 25 years of having the same bellsouth.net email addresses, they stopped communicating with the AT&T.net servers (or I guess more correctly, yahoo servers). After contacting AT&T support several times with no solution being provided (I’ll spare you the details of those calls), I decided to spend a day and do a whole lot of research.

 

The big change that is being implemented is the requirement to use email clients that use OAuth encryption. If you have a client like, oh let’s say, Outlook, you will need to create a “secure mail key” to use as the password since Outlook does NOT support OAuth. See this link for more info.

 

https://www.att.com/esupport/article.html#!/email-support/KM1240308

 

The next steps are what I found that worked for me.

 

  1. Log into your myAT&T main account. (for me it was my U-Verse account)

 

  1. In the upper right-hand corner, click on the drop-down next to your name.

 

  1. Click on “View Profile”.

 

  1. Click on “Sign-in Info”.

 

  1. Look at the “My linked accounts” box(s) near the bottom. Make sure that you have a linked account for each bellsouth.net email account you have. If you don’t, click on the blue “Link another account” button and link your additional bellsouth.net email accounts, one at a time.

 

  1. Once you have your main account and all other email accounts visible, each one in its own box, you can start creating a “Secure mail key” for each account.

 

  1. Click on “Manager secure mail keys” for one of the email accounts.

 

  1. On the next screen, make sure you select the account from the dropdown you want to work with.

 

  1. Enter a nickname for the key you will create.

 

  1. Click on “Create secure email key”.

 

  1. The next screen will display your new key and allow you to copy it to your clipboard. Write the key down so you can use it if you have multiple devices with that email account.

 

  1. I then needed to remove each email account from Outlook and the add them back in one at a time, using the associated “secure mail key” for each account.

 

Since I have Outlook 2016, the Add Email Account screens are very sparse and even if you click on Advanced Settings, Outlook tries to connect the account without showing you the server settings. If it fails, then it asks if you want to look at the settings.

 

By creating and using the “secure mail key” for each email account, I am now able to connect to the servers and send and receive emails.

 

It’s unfortunate that AT&T has not better communicated this change to its customers. What’s worse, when I asked AT&T support if they knew anything about the OAuth and/or Secure mail keys, they said no. Unfortunately, not surprising.

 

If this helps even one other user, it was worth me writing this up. Good Luck!

Contributor

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2 Messages

4 years ago

I'm not real computer savvy. I was trying to find the Outlook 2016 file so I could set up my secure mail key. How do I get to that? Thanks

Contributor

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2 Messages

4 years ago

I'm not real computer savvy. How do I pull up outlook to delete and add back my email. I have set up the secure mail key but can't get into outlook. This is terrible

Expert

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15K Messages

4 years ago

@timbrown - maybe this will help.

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