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UncleSugar's avatar
UncleSugar
New Contributor
7 years ago

Unable to Download Email

Commencing this past Friday morning (February 2) I have been encountering an ongoing problem—not yet solved--with the downloading of my Cox email to my PC’s Mozilla Thunderbird email client software. Whenever I attempt to retrieve my messages, I receive the following pop-up error message:

"The RETR command did not succeed. Error retrieving a message. Mail server pop.cox.net responded: message 2 expunged.”

Consequently I’m unable to download/view any incoming emails using Mozilla Thunderbird.

Once this started happening, I went directly to my webmail account at the Cox website to check out the server situation there—and experienced further issues. I identified one specific email message in my inbox at the Cox server which posed the following difficulties:

  • Whenever I tried to open this particular email to read, a pop-up error message would display, advising, “Error while loading message content. Folder “INBOX” has been closed on mail server 127.0.0.1. Probably your request took too long.”
  • Whenever I tried to delete  this particular message (and move to Trash) another pop-up error message would display, advising, "Error. This message could not be moved to trash folder, possibly because your mailboxIs nearly full. In that case, please try to empty your deleted items first, or delete smaller messages first.” 

Cox Technical Support has been totally ineffective in correcting the above described email problem. Since this past Friday, I have had four separate contacts with Cox Tier 2 Tech Support concerning this matter, as follows:

  • Problem initially referred to Tier 2 Support Friday morning, February 2 for resolution. I provided Tier 2 representative with my email password so he could attempt to delete the problem inbox email message mentioned above; however, he too was unable to accomplish. Assigned ticket number to issue; Cox Tier 2 rep assured follow up action will be taken to fix.
  • Contacted Cox Tier 2 Tech Support again on Saturday, February 3, as problem not corrected. Tier 2 rep advised that my email problem was a “known issue” and had been escalated to Cox’s “email team.”
  • Contacted Cox Tier 2 Tech Support again on Monday, February 5, as problem not corrected. Tier 2 rep told me once again that my encountered email situation was “known issue” and that many other Cox customers were similarly affected. However, he indicated that an immediate fix was on the way involving a special “auto-loop” program that Cox would be running on their email server(s).  Accordingly, rep indicated that my email problem should be corrected by tomorrow afternoon. Tier 2 rep also assigned a “secondary ticket number” to my issue.
  • Tuesday late afternoon, February 6: problem still evident. Contacted Cox Tier 2 Tech Support once again. This time the rep gave me a different update. Yes, my problem was indeed a “known issue involving time outs” (whatever that means), but unfortunately there is no immediate solution. Apparently it can’t be fixed until Cox completes a “total migration of all email accounts to new hardware servers,” and as yet they don’t have a firm date as to when this migration effort will be fully accomplished. In response to my query, rep advised my particular email account has already migrated to a new server, and she was unable to help me any further.  At this juncture, I requested to speak to a supervisor. I was connected to a supervisor named David; he too corroborated this new information—that my problem couldn’t be fixed until the aforementioned migration of Cox email accounts was 100 percent completed; moreover, he couldn’t furnish an estimated date for such completion. 

Bottom line, the latest information received from Cox Technical Support is unacceptable, and, assuming this post is read by the Cox Help Team, I would desire this issue be escalated further for resolution. I’ve noted that other Cox customers have already reported the identical problem on this forum. That’s why I’ve gone into considerable detail to describe—and the wholly useless and unhelpful Cox responses thus far.

 

 

 

 

 

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  • UncleSugar's avatar
    UncleSugar
    New Contributor

    Lo and behold, this morning I was finally able to download all my stuck Cox inbox email messages to my Mozilla Thunderbird software--for the first time since February 1st. The download included the "bad" message that was apparently causing the problem. Hopefully this restoral of normal email retrieval will continue.

    Since I had received conflicting information from Cox Tier 2 Technical Support personnel last week, I called them this morning to advise them that I am again able to download my incoming messages from their server and to inquire as to what they did to correct my issue.

    The Tier 2 rep advised that in my case, they were able to go into the appropriate server handling my email account and re-encrypt the single incoming message that was causing the "Error 127.0.0.1" block (they were able to do so by "changing permissions" on this particular message). This effort was successful. In this regard, she also informed me that not all reported instances of this type of trouble can be fixed like mine--instead, some customers will indeed have to wait until full migration of Cox email accounts to new servers is completed (with target date of next month, March).

    So, from how I interpreted the Tier 2 rep's information this morning, I was fortunate in that they were able to resolve my individual situation.

    Bottom line, they did follow up with my trouble tickets. That fact is encouraging. However, I still am not pleased by the differing responses I received last week during my four separate contacts with Tier 2 Support when reporting/discussing my issue and the lack of any definitive follow-up feedback regarding corrective actions on their part. 

      

  • Crakow's avatar
    Crakow
    New Contributor

    Thank you UncleSugar for your detailed posts!  I had exactly the same problem starting yesterday. But I'm lucky in that while the migration is still in progress, my account  has already been migrated.  I was told by Tier 2 rep that the error messages can appear again if an email is corrupted, but there is now a simple solution for migrated accounts: blue bar at top settings (gearbox)/settings/inbox/common/click on "permanently remove deleted emails"

  • BobCo's avatar
    BobCo
    New Contributor

    You were lucky. I have a problem which different  Email Accouts are set Inactive every day, so I miss emails sent to me and they are not stored or bounced back to the sender. When the Accounts are set inactive, there is no warning or notification. My tickets have gone to a Tier 3 but no fix after two months .