My problem with OPTUS commenced about 3 months ago when I started to get emails from my optusnet.com.au address bouncing back from bigpond.com. I have had the address for many years as I have had my fully hardwired $79.mth NbN service from OPTUS. Progressively I then started to have bounce backs from other addresses including bigpond.net.au. The real frustration started when I contacted OPTUS and attempted to have them determine the cause of the problem and fix it. To date I have repeated my personal details about 20X to various parties, reiterated the details of the problem, been put on HOLD for a total of 120mins, been transferred to OPTUS employee support (and even asked for my employee number), promised call backs that never happened and been left hanging with no one on the other end of the phone. They apologise profusely and make many promises BUT DO NOT DELIVER. This morning (17/8/2023) the problem continues and when they agreed to entertaining my request for bill relief I was transferred to a BLACK HOLE.
Am I alone with this or this this Standard OPTUS BAD PRACTICE?
You may not be alone. Your thoughts on the following might help others understand your issues more clearly and offer more informed replyâs.
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Are you saying Telstra is bouncing emails from your Optus email service that you are forwarding to your Telstra/bigpond email account?
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Can we assume both email accounts work OK receiving and sending email other than for that one example?
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What exactly is it that suggests the problem is with Optus as the sender and not Telstra as the recipient?
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Does gmail or any other non Telstra server refuse your emails sent from your Optus account!
OT but prior to NBN I was with iPrimus and bigpond started bouncing emails, and then hotmail and the other Microsoft domains. The problem was that the recipient servers determined iPrimus was a significant source of spam and thus blocked everything from it.
It might or might not be related, but if @dalevaneveryâs email address has been âspoofedâ by spammers and scammers it could be (not necessarily is) they are blocking it as a spam/scam source.
Given the Optus data breach last year, which would have included many Optus email addresses I believe, other email servers may be scrutinizing mail coming in from Optus source.
Looking for signs of spam or scam activity and blocking if their rules detect an issue.
What does the send rejected message say in detail? This often gives the reason.
Also, see if your email address could be considered compromised by putting it into haveibeenpwned.com
As to your other issue of poor customer service in getting an answer and/or a fix, well that is something other Telcos share.
It sounds like you arenât alone in Telstra/Bigpond blocking your email address:
This thread provides some information which may be of interest.
You may need to contact Telstra to see if they can whitelist your email address so that emails can be delivered to bigpond email addresses. If they do, it might solve the problem with Bigpond. However, if your Optus email address has been blacklisted more widely, there might be many other email servers which deny delivery of your emails. You may not know this is occurring.
If your email is on blacklists and was caused by the Optus breach, I would be contacting Optus with this information. I would be requesting a new email address from them and asking that any emails received at your current email address, is forwarded to your new address. Over time it would be wise to discard your existing address.
How bad is Optus
Digressing first:
More like âHow bad is Telstraâ. It is not just Optus that has problems with Telstra.
Some years ago I was involved in an exercise of sending out lots of emails (completely legitimate, solicited by the receiving person, not spam, not scam) and then dealing with the bounces. All email was being sent by a high-profile, reputable, mail sending company i.e. not being sent from any specific ISP, not being sent from an ISP at all.
We had far and away most problems with Telstra compared with any other receiving company (even allowing for Telstraâs market share).
It then becomes impossible to resolve with Telstra because Telstra wonât talk to you at all unless you are a Telstra customer. So on occasions we would have to contact the receiving person by phone, explain to them what the problem was, and then get that person to contact Telstra support (and we all know how delightful an experience that is) - but this often did not work because many of the recipients were not technically sophisticated.
I came to the conclusion that Telstra had simply configured their anti-spam to âoversensitiveâ. That is a completely fine decision if the person making the decision is the only one affected (e.g. me configuring my personal email server) but obviously troublesome when millions of Telstra customers are potentially affected.
Even apart from the âTelstraâ problem, this is sometimes a pig of a problem because there are so many players globally i.e. so many moving parts in the overall anti-spam effort.
But just to summarise
It is Telstraâs decision to bounce an email. There is little that Optus can do.
The starting point for investigating that is to see the full bounce back message (headers and body).
You may of course not want to post that publicly. I completely respect that but in that case there is probably not much that anyone here can say about fixing it.
Well, apart from ⊠set up an email address that is independent of your ISP, preferably a paid service, and start the process of migrating to that email address.
That will
- make the problem go away as far as the Optus v. Telstra email problem goes, and
- give you the flexibility to leave Optus later on if they are really annoying you.
You are not alone, and this is indeed Optus BAD practice. If one looks at their website it seems that help is only a message or 'phone call away, but the reality is far worse - their communication channels are next to useless.
I am having exactly the same problem with Bigpond emails not making it out of the Optus environment. It has been happening for some time and is an intermittent fault. Optus takes the standard approach at first, suggesting that the fault might be with someone else - anyone else but Optus. They tell you to clear your cache, which does nothing but stuff up all the other web settings that have accumulated on your computer. As a rule, their first option is always to deflect the issue.
Eventually, however, in a rare breath of honesty they did acknowledge that mission control does have a problem, telling me that âThere is a known issue with Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail/Outlook, Telstra Bigpond (Senderscore/Abusix), Comcast, and other companies blocking or delaying emails from @optusnet.com.au addressesâ.
If I send an email to a bigpond address it bounces back with the message âThis is the mail system at host mail104.syd.optusnet.com.au. Iâm sorry to have to inform you that your message could not be delivered to one or more recipients.â If I change my sending address to a gmail address then it goes straight through.
So it is an Optus issue compounded by appalling customer service. A couple of days ago I used their online chat which allegedly speeds your enquiry and provides productive assistance. In reality, it starts with an AI chat bot with very little AI. Then it promotes the call to a human - but that human is simultaneously handling God knows how many other calls so that my 5 minute query ended up lasting 90 minutes !!! This happens every single time I try that option.
Currently they are allegedly working on fixing the problem, but that has been the response for months. Itâs really tempting me to take the plunge and move to another ISP.
So ⊠no, you are not alone !!
I had the same problem trying to send Telstra BigPond emails when connected through Westnet-(now part of TPG through iiNet). Westnet explained it was an issue with how a Westnet configured oneâs network settings for better security. There used to be a set of instructions on which ports to open (change settings) to fix it. Be at your own risk.
Note that BigPond mail not being sent when connected through an ISP/RSP other than Telstra is likely a different issue to that of the OP. The only other
I am also experiencing problems. OPTUS webmail cannot send any emails for about 3 weeks now.Yes, also been through their mill. At the moment, am on hold for a MANAGER - I think call is in another country with the auto bot saying âpls press 1 to be re-directed to holding queue or continue to hold to reach this agentâ If I cancel, I pay $145 to keep their router (modem). Finally, have spoken to a human in the Philippines who said only the customer relations person can follow-up! No MANAGER!
I have left numerous messages to this CR person who was to call me back today, so I called him back again where his voice msg stated âI will call you back in 2 bus. daysâ. I give up!
After writing (snailmail) to the Optus CEO have had a response that is comforting for those that are not as sceptical as I. It seems the next level up in Optus is not about âescalatingâ but âinvestigatingâ. For a problem that has had itâs origins as far back as 2015 (based on Whirlpool forum) the time for investigation has surely lapsed.
BTW I doubt if my letter actually got anywhere near the CEO and so far she has not done me the courtesy of even a brief reply. How BAD is OPTUS!
Dale
My problem relates to their dreadful communication system. They emailed me last month to say they were forcing us on to new mobile contracts which were going to increase our costs. So I set in train an attempt to get them to reduce the cost.
I found they have four methods of contacting me; by email, by text message, through the Optus app and by phone. All of them come from a âno replyâ source so I am unable to reply directly to any of them. All of them gave me conflicting, incorrect or incomplete information at one stage or another. Because they randomly use the different methods it is almost impossible for me to keep a continuous written record of my communications with them.
One person who eventually rang me to supposedly fix my problem said he wasnât able to see the email Optus had sent me to change my contract - I had to forward a copy to him!
Optus sent me a text warning they were charging me extra fees. When I contacted them through the Optus app, the responder said they couldnât tell me why Optus was charging me extra fees and were unable to see any information about my costs.
Even when I was able to speak to people on the phone and then asked them to send me an email to confirm what was agreed they either said they couldnât send me an email (really?) or I have never received one.
Whilst they eventually cancelled the incorrect additional charges on the bill they had already sent to us, when I asked if the continuing incorrect charges would be taken off my next bill, I was told that couldnât be done and I would have to contact them again after I receive the next bill (and presumably go through the same process).
I believe their communication system is deliberately designed to make it difficult for customers to contact them and is designed to avoid them having to fix problems.
Rather ironic that they are a communications company!
Needless to say, I have recently been looking carefully at the recent Choice comparison of other ISPs!
This mirrors my experience and as you say is astonishing from a company specialising in communication. Of course they are not alone, and many companies are now virtually uncontactable in real time. The only reason I havenât voted with my feet is the problem of changing my email address and landline number. There really should be the equivalent of Australia Postâs mail forwarding so that people are able to move more easily.
Perhaps I am showing my age, but I do yearn for the days when you could easily pick up the 'phone and talk to someone without being forced to use an app or some other pathway. I would also appreciate trained staff whose grasp of English was sufficient to understand sometimes complex issues.
Simple answer: Customers of Optus get an email address in one domain. Employees of Optus get an email address in a different domain.
Number portability to a different provider is very easy, in most cases complete within a few hours and almost all within 24 hours, even for landlines. We have moved 3 times and had several providers of landline services (both due to the moves and changes of providers for plans that suited us) without having to change our home number. For mobiles if you buy a SIM for a different provider, they either ask in the online application if you want to port your number or if you deal with them by phone call it is a question they ask. In all casesâŠif not asked by the customer service officer, then make sure to request the port before completing the changeover.
If wanting to change from Optus (or any other provider) and you use the RSP provided address, then set up a free google, yahoo, outlook or similar address beforehand and send to all your contacts from your old address (those contacts you want to have your new address) the new address you have created with a CC â-not a BCCâ- to your new address (ensures you get a copy of the contact address in your new email account). Then start the process of changing over to the new RSP. Banks and similar, you will need to go into your accounts that you hold with them and update to your new details.
The question was rhetorical.
I guess changing the landline part might be easy enough, but the real hassle would be in the numerous places one deals with who have their own systems to update. If, for example, one looks at the number of passwords we have to have these days the numbers are a bit scary. Each one has to be changed manually and provided with the new email address.
Just out of interest I looked in my password manager and discovered that I have 354 passwords !!! That means logging into 354 websites and altering my email address !! Now thatâs a challenge. 
That seems excessive and might be time to rationalise the password manager, by removing those logins (closing accounts) no longer used or needed. Keeping accounts open for no reason can increase oneâs risk of a data breach and/or identity theft.
Marvelous how quickly the original topic is left behind
It isnât really left behind. Bottom line is: if you donât like Optus and they have â â â â âed you off sufficiently then you will want to leave but ⊠the hassle of migrating off your ISP-provided email address is a legitimate challenge, involving for some customers a substantial investment in time.
Having said that
migrating off your ISP-provided email address could be a good opportunity to review whether some logins are still required
and fraud on the actual site. (For example, you havenât used them for 5 years - so you arenât keeping an eye on whatâs happening with your login - but you did legitimately use them back then and they collected lots of information including potentially CC info ⊠and the site has subsequently changed hands and/or been repurposed.)
Their support online or by phone is beyond useless. Donât waste your time itâs just aggravating.
I go to a store, if I have a problem. The staff are always helpful and competent.
