why can't they say what they mean

I am fed up with things being improved for "my convenience".

I have an old Freeserve pop3 email address. This is xxx@dbroada.freeserve etc which works really well. I can put whatever I like in front of the @ to help filter messages. I can use van@dbroada to keep all posts about my van together, I can use junk@dbroada for anything I reluctantly have to register for and surprise surprise, that is the one where lots of spam comes in on.

Today I have been told that EE (current owners of Freeserve) will be turning off their email servers at the end of May and suggest the current users get themselves a Gmail account.

They do indicate that there isn't much traffic on their servers so presumably it has become uneconomical to keep them running. I would have been disappointed but understanding if they had made that point clear. My objection is why do they have to dress it up saying that using a Gmail address will make my life easier because the format is so simple? I am happy not having a simple address, I haven't spent the last 20 years wishing I had an email address that was easy to use and if I had I would have changed before now, not waited for them to turn off their server.

Why can't people stop trying to make changes that are good to them appear good for me?

Slightly away from this rant but similar is I consider the worst words to find on a food packet is "new improved recipe".

I got the email about shutting down the EE mail servers about a month ago. I've stayed with Freeserve and it's many new owners since not quite the beginning and hope they don't decide to close down their broadband service because no-one else can offer me the same facilities at a similar price.
To be honest, the .fsnet.co.uk email has had very little use for quite a while and most of my email adds are now with gmail.

Frank

dbroada wrote:I am fed up with things being improved for "my convenience"

Why can't people stop trying to make changes that are good to them appear good for me?

Hear hear !

The most obscure example of this business of doing things for my convenience was however a few days ago on a Brittany Ferries ferry.  As we parked we heard the announcement,,:

"For your convenience please leave your vehicle with the handbrake on and in first gear."

I agree that it would not be convenient to come back at the end of the journey and discover our van had run amok and destroyed itself and several others but convenience is the last thing to be taken into consideration here surely.

I wonder why they have delayed giving me notification then. Probably working back through their lists.

I will probably be switching broadband providers soon though. I have stayed with EE partly because I didn't want to surrender such a useful email feature. My broadband speeds are very low here (indicated 2-6Mb but I've never seen anything as fast as that) so about 3 years ago I ordered fibre broadband. That has still not arrived and the local box is now said to be out of capacity so I may as well look elsewhere, and join the queue for when the box capacity is expanded.

Quilter wrote:

dbroada wrote:I am fed up with things being improved for "my convenience"

Why can't people stop trying to make changes that are good to them appear good for me?

Hear hear !

The most obscure example of this business of doing things for my convenience was however a few days ago on a Brittany Ferries ferry.  As we parked we heard the announcement,,:

"For your convenience please leave your vehicle with the handbrake on and in first gear."

I agree that it would not be convenient to come back at the end of the journey and discover our van had run amok and destroyed itself and several others but convenience is the last thing to be taken into consideration here surely.

and "for your convenience" we are taking your photograph while using this ATM machine.

dbroada wrote:I wonder why they have delayed giving me notification then. Probably working back through their lists.

I will probably be switching broadband providers soon though. I have stayed with EE partly because I didn't want to surrender such a useful email feature.

You can get yourself a domain name quite cheaply [about £6 per year] and host it on one of the free isp servers, I have a .dotandfrank.uk email address which I registered  HERE .

My broadband speeds are very low here (indicated 2-6Mb but I've never seen anything as fast as that) so about 3 years ago I ordered fibre broadband. That has still not arrived and the local box is now said to be out of capacity so I may as well look elsewhere, and join the queue for when the box capacity is expanded.

My EE router is a 'Brightbox' which I think is very good, it runs 3 PC's, a tablet & phone happily, plus any guest's computers when they come to stay. It also has a USB port in which I have a memory stick that I use as a network drive.

Frank

Thank you Frank, I'll look.

I have a bright box too but it's the cable in the street that doesn't have the speed. The box that doesn't have capacity is the local junction box just across the road from my flat. I may live in London but that doesn't mean fast internet speeds are available to me.

Part of the reason there isn't much traffic on their servers is because they stopped issuing new email addresses about five years ago. Presumably for their own convenience and in anticipation of removing the facility.

I have five or six orange.net / fsnet email addresses and so far have had notification to three of those, spread over the past 3-4 weeks so presumably they're notifying in batches, possibly also to avoid gmail, who they recommend as replacement, being overwhelmed.

I have spent countless hours changing email contact addresses and logins with the many online registrations I have built up over the years and am still finding a few more coming in each day that I'd forgotten.  I have posted on several threads on the EE Community forum expressing my displeasure.

Since EE took over Freeserve/Wanadoo/Orange many of the previous benefits have disappeared, including the 'Free-for-Life" broadband we were given as an incentive to join/stay with Orange mobile phone service.

Our standard EE broadband at home has gone steadily downhill however I have recently upgraded to EE fibre (to cabinet) and it is considerably better.  The cost, including free 24/7 calls to landlines and mobiles (plus overseas which I don't need these days) wasn't much more than renewing the standard service and so far it has been a massive improvement.

Looking at reviews and social media, all of the big mobile and home broadband suppliers are as bad as one another for customer service, showing equal disdain often for their most longstanding customers - loyalty seems to be a one-way-street!

What will happen as the BT takeover bites is yet to be seen . . .

Going back to the OP, the other similar thing that annoys me is when banks, credit cards and utilities offer to 'allow' you to go over to paperless billing 'for your convenience'.  No mention of the fact that it must save them tens of thousands a year in paper, printing, folding & envelope stuffing time and labour, plus postage costs - I've never been offered any discount in return.

rogerblack wrote:Going back to the OP, the other similar thing that annoys me is when banks, credit cards and utilities offer to 'allow' you to go over to paperless billing 'for your convenience'.  No mention of the fact that it must save them tens of thousands a year in paper, printing, folding & envelope stuffing time and labour, plus postage costs - I've never been offered any discount in return.

The very first ATM card I got was for the Abbey building society. Naturally I changed the PIN number to something more memorable. When that card was replaced 2 (maybe more) year later, for my convenience it retained THE ORIGINAL PIN number. Yes, the one I forgot 2 years previously. I changed banks.

I suppose we don't deserve a discount, after all, it is so much more convenient now.

Waiting for me when I got back a letter from my pension provider to say that " for your convenience" they are not going to send me a monthly statement of my pension but I can set up an online viewing screen. There follows a long and involved set of instructions as to how to do this, involving a password and User Name.

I like having a bit of paper to file each month, don't want to have to print it at my own expense and can never remember passwords and user names. Given that those of us invited to use this system are pensioners I guess I am not alone in wondering about the use of " your convenience" in this context.

Recently- for my convenience- Sainsbury's bank have started sending me paper monthly statements- previously it was an annual statement.

I have £4:07 in my account!