Protect yourself online
llee040's profile

Mentor

 • 

113 Messages

Thursday, November 19th, 2015 10:12 PM

sbcglobal.net account - IMAP would solve my issue

After many years of being unable to solve my issue with sbcglobal.net email, I'm determined to find a way.

 

I understand that I may not be able to use IMAP with the sbcglobal account (at least that's what I've been told in the past). I don't care whether I call my service IMAP, POP, or anything else, but I need to be able to see all my email from various available devices and email clients. The reason I think that IMAP provides the simplest method for this type of configuration is that I want to use my Mac Outlook 15 (2016) client's email organizational features to put emails in folders and perform additional functions to my email content automatically, and make that folder structure exist on the server for various clients to use. In other words, I can configure Outlook 15 to do things automatically with my IMAP email accounts and sync with the server so that this organizational status becomes current for whatever clients access those accounts later. Is it possible to achieve such a configuration for my current sbcglobal account, and if not, what can I do to get AT&T to provide me with such email configuration options? Thanks.

Mentor

 • 

113 Messages

8 years ago

No, this doesn't help. The account I have now is a POP account. There is no problem connecting to my account using using the POP settings for my preferred email client. The problem with a POP account is that choosing the POP option to leave messages on the server doesn't allow me to use my preferred email client to make organizational changes that will subsequently be recognized on each client or device used to access the email. That's what I'm trying to fix. One way to solve the problem would be for the POP sbcglobal.net account to be converted on the server side to an IMAP account, but I have no idea whether that is currently possible. I have been told by AT&T support in the past that it is not possible. At any rate, this is not an issue that can be solved by making changes to connection configurations on the client side. I've tried that already. The deficiency appears to be caused by limitations of services offered through a POP account.

Guru

 • 

498 Messages

8 years ago


@llee040 wrote:

 One way to solve the problem would be for the POP sbcglobal.net account to be converted on the server side to an IMAP account, but I have no idea whether that is currently possible. I have been told by AT&T support in the past that it is not possible.


Not at all possible.  The connection type is defined when you create a new account in the client and cannot be changed.  To switch from POP3 to IMAP you'll need to create a new mail account with server settings as listed in the link provided.  And using IMAP is the only way to achieve your requirements.  POP3 is a relic from the days when no one owned more than one computing device and 20MB was a lot of storage.

Professor

 • 

3.9K Messages

8 years ago

 

Looking at it again, the settings for IMAP do look pretty streightforward.

Apparently, att\s e-mail server will now handle all the differant domains, instead of having to use one for each type. (shrug)

This is for outlook 2013, but the file types and port settings should be easy enough to figure out for proper enty into your particular e-mail app.

Let's get started

Follow these steps to update your email server settings:
  1. Open Outlook 2013.
  2. Select File.
  3. Select Account Settings.
  4. Select the email account to update.
  5. In Internet Email Settings verify that:
    • You have POP3 or IMAP selected.
    • Your User Name and Password are correct.
  6. Enter the following:
    • For POP3 accounts, enter inbound.att.net for the Incoming mail server and outbound.att.net for the Outgoing mail server.
    • For IMAP accounts, enter imap.mail.att.net for the Incoming mail server, and smtp.mail.att.net for the Outgoing mail server.
  7. Select More Settings.
  8. Select the Outgoing Server tab.
  9. Verify the following:
    • My outgoing server (SMTPrequires authentication is checked.
    • Use same settings as my incoming mail server is selected.
  10. Select the Advanced tab.
  11. Enter the following:
    • For POP3 accounts, the Incoming server (POP3) is port 995, the checkbox for This server requires a secure connection (SSL) is selected, and the Outgoing server (SMTP) is port 465.
    • For IMAP accounts, the Incoming server (IMAP) is port 993, the checkbox for This server requires a secure connection (SSL) is selected, and the Outgoing server (SMTP) is port 465 or 587.
  12. Select OK.
  13. On the Internet E-mail Settings window, select Next.
  14. Select Finish.

- See more at: https://www.att.com/esupport/article.html#!/email-support/KM1049565?source=redirect

Mentor

 • 

113 Messages

8 years ago

My AT&T email service plan through Yahoo only allows creation of new email accounts in the form of a limited quantity of subaccounts. A quantity of subaccounts is apparently still available for me to create. Last time I created one, I wasn't made aware of any option for choosing between IMAP and POP, and only the POP option for the email client turned out to be compatible (I tried setting up the IMAP first with no success). I suppose it's possible that since that time (probably about 18 months ago), a new option for choosing IMAP rather than POP has been made available. Do you know if that's the case? I think I've reached the point at which not being able to insist that I require an IMAP account is a deal breaker for my subscriptions to AT&T.

Guru

 • 

498 Messages

8 years ago

I use IMAP on my primary account but I don't expect it would work any differently with a sub-account.  Just create the sub-account first so the email address exists, then proceed with the Outlook setup, specifying IMAP at the start (you can't go back and change it).  You must be careful to specify the correct servers, ports and SSL settings or it won't work.

Mentor

 • 

113 Messages

8 years ago

I called AT&T customer service. The support rep for internet services made a change on their side during my call that allowed me to add the new sub-account to my email client as IMAP rather than POP. Perhaps something in Outlook 2013 for Windows manages that process in the background, but for my Mac Outlook 2016 client app, it didn't work until the support rep made the change for me. Once I discovered that it could be done for the new empty sub-account, I requested the same change for my established account, and was then able to add a new instance for the account in the Outlook 2016 client using IMAP rather than POP. Last time I asked AT&T support to do that (around 18 mo. ago, if memory serves correctly), I was told it couldn't be done. You thought it couldn't be done as well, so apparently the option only recently became available.  I have a bunch of locally stored mail to upload, and rules and scripts to reconfigure, but this is definitely progress.

Contributor

 • 

1 Message

7 years ago

If you want your sub accounts to show in Microsoft Office Outlook you need to use an IMAP account and go here for directions on how to specifically set it up:

 

https://www.att.com/support/article/email-support/KM1086159

(edited)

Not finding what you're looking for?
New to AT&T Community?
New to the AT&T Community? Start by visiting the Community How-To.
New to the AT&T Community?
Visit the Community How-To.