Step 5: Research your mail provider

Or...Why MSN and Hotmail are just a really bad idea.

Hotmail was highly recommended to me a few days ago as being faster, less spam, etc. So I spent a few days researching the community forums to see just how satisfied the users are and what issues they are encountering to determine if Hotmail would work for me or not.

To my dismay here is what I learned about Hotmail. You of course should also do your own research and decide for yourself. I am not related to anyone in the examples. This is merely the results of my personal consumer research to decide if I too would like to be a hotmail user. And for me I will say No Thanks, but you decide.

At the time I write this there are well over 1579 complaints just in the past 24 hours! That's 65.79 complaints per hour.

Why? Well it seems that back on 01 September 2009, Microsoft thought they had found the solution to their hotmail servers being used for spamming. So they implemented a new "Anti-Spam System" and viola! You can get your account blocked, closed or even your IP address blacklisted for mailing your resume to potential employers, or using your cell-phone to send emails.

Now for the really cool part, if your contact has not set their email client options correctly, guess what? Yep, you get your account blocked, closed, or your IP address blacklisted. Even better when your account is in lock down those who email you may get their email returned with a note that informs them that your account is blocked for spamming, really cool if you happen to be a scout leader whom the parents have entrusted their children with.

Just a few of the things you cannot do with your hotmail account;

1. Forget using it to send your resume to potential employers.
http://windowslivehelp.com/community/t/131488.aspx
(Job seeker blocked for emailing her CV (Resume) to potential employers.)

2. Forget using it to communicate upcoming fund-raisers for scouts.
http://windowslivehelp.com/community/p/129013/480143.aspx#480143
(Pack leader blocked for informing parents of upcoming popcorn sale.)

3. Forget using it to communicate news, events, debate schedules, etc. if you are a member of a school club.
http://windowslivehelp.com/community/p/120873/454906.aspx#454906
(Secretary of high school key club blocked for sending newsletter to club members.)

4. Forget using it to communicate with team members, other teams, etc. if you are part of youth sports or sports in general.
http://windowslivehelp.com/community/p/29019/118332.aspx#118332
(Secretary of youth football league blocked for sending invites to other league secretaries for upcoming tournaments.)

The list goes on forever, Microsoft claims it is necessary to prevent spamming. Hmmm, if I was a spammer would I go through the trouble of asking Microsoft to unblock my account so I can spam some more? Really?

Wow, what's really sad is there are many "Paid Premium Subscribers" who get blocked and no refund and no account, because you didn't have your email client options set right and it misidentified Joey's Graduation Invite as spam, all because Joey didn't phrase the subject line just right. Now Joey has to subscribe again, hopefully not, to hotmail's premium services.

Or how about this, Joey doesn't know that you changed ISP's and have a new email address or simply you changed it because the old one was boring, yep Joey's mail gets returned and Joey gets blocked, or closed because he also had Auntie May's old email too, and it also get's returned.

Maybe Microsoft is where old politicians go when finally voted out of office. The above links are provided to demonstrate Microsoft's continual commitment to the highest level of Customer No-Service and Dissatisfaction.

Google's gmail and YahooMail don't look that bad after all.

Follow any one of the above links and look at the "In the past 24 hours" numbers and divide by 24 that's how many people have posted a new question to the sending limits forum, mostly complaining that their account is blocked or closed. Look at the time-stamp on the unanswered questions and you will see some still waiting days later to be answered. Look at the bottom of the page and you will see how many pages there currently are of these questions. Many question threads have multiple users asking why their account is blocked or closed.

And as usual it is the user, their software, computer or their ISP that is at fault and NOT Microsoft's new and improved "Anti-Spam" system. Strange that problem was almost non-existant prior to 01 September 2009.

While it may be that you will get a little more spam than hotmail with gmail or yahoomail, at least you wont get your account blocked because Marcus forgot to add you to his approved sender list.

Make sure you thoroughly research your mail provider before signing up especially if you will be paying them a fee for the service.

Always get back on that bike and keep peddling down the road to your success!

Cheers!