where are my emails?
 

i couldn’t access my email earlier today and when i checked it right now every message was gone where are my emails? why did they disappear i need them is there anyway they can be recovered? i need get this figured out ive had emails from 2 years ago in that account how could they just be gone?

Same problem here. I can get into my address book, calendar, etc. But, when I try to "check mail" I am told that my mailbox is "temporarily unavailable". Well, it has been temporarily unavailable for at least 3 days now.

Holy cow, I thought it was just me!

I've been locked out of my account with the "temporary unavailable" message since 5:00PM on 6/21/06! A week w/o my email, I'm goin' nuts.

I've tried repeatedly to use the Yahoo email contact, but it's worthless. All I received back was the same stupid standard form response they initially send out to everyone w/ the same error message. I then responded to the email (which it says to do) if I still had problems. As of today, no further responses have been forthcoming. I then tried send another initial email request stating the problem again, twice, w/ no response AT ALL! Then the topper, I received today an email asking me to take a survey regarding their handling of my email inquiry!

Frustrating, incredibly frustrating, since NO ONE there apparently gives a damn about this problem.

I've tried everything imaginable, including different PCs, different OS's, deleting cookies, rebooting, different browsers (IE, FF, Opera), even tried the new beta release, you name it, nothing helps. And since I can't find a tech support phone #, what's left to do??

If someone finds some "magical" means to fix this problem, please post it! I suspect the mailbox is corrupted and will require a hard reset on the server side to get past this problem. Perhaps even the loss of existing email. I've been using Yahoo mail since 1999, never once had anything like this happen. I have had the "temp unavailable" error before, but it's always been easily correctable w/ a logout/login sequence. Never had it be out for a WEEK!

I'm at my wits end on this one.

What a totally worthless company this Yahoo is.

I decided to resend my initial inquiry regarding this "temporary access" problem since no one ever seems to respond to my responses to their initial replies.

Do ya know those damn fools sent me ANOTHER STANDARD FORM RESPONSE! And that's after a detailed PLEA to NOT send me a standard form response and full description of the problem. It's as if these people don't bother to read these inquires at all. They just find a few key words, find a standard response that seems to apply, and send it. It's like talking to a brick wall. All I can assume is these initial responses are computer generated, because no amount of pleading seems to matter.

You would AT LEAST expect someone to respond to your reply to their computer generated response after 7 days. So far, not a beep.

What a worthless company and tech support system. Utterly ridiculous. And they sent me yet another tech support survery to complete.

God help anyone who needs tech support from these ppl. As long as you don't need any help, even for problems THEY are responsible for, I suppose it works. But if you need real help, forget about it. You'll never want to rest your business or vital email on the shoulders of these guys. They will leave you high and dry.

After a WEEK without my email, I'm totally disgusted.

Backup your own data
 

When no human being ever answers it's usually because some more senior human being in the company has screwed up. A mere router failure or other hardwarefault fault would get fixed in a few hours, and you'd get a chipper response telling you how effective their technical backup was. But after all this time and still no data.... somebody at Yahoo has reasons for not saying anything. Maybe the manager whose job it was to ensure that the backups worked? Maybe the bean counter who ran out of beans to pay the server farm which hosted your emails. Who knows?

Yahoo is free to users. As we don't pay them anything we have no rights where our data are concerned, so it's safer for Yahoo never to say anything in a situation like this because anything they DID say could get pounced on by a lawyer as an admission of liability.

The hard lesson is this:- always make backups on your own PC of any data you entrust to Yahoo. It's boring and time consuming and a nuisance, but I'm afraid the alternative may be an exciting problem you can do without.

While I'll understand what you're saying, that doesn't fully explain what's happening here. It's one thing to lose my current data, it's quite another to NEVER give me access to the account again!

Hell, I can live w/ data loss. I'm under no illusions when it comes to the distinct possibility that Yahoo or any other web-based email system could suffer data loss. But that's a risk I'm willing to take for the convenience of having them manage the data and having access from anywhere in the world.

Even if such data loss occurs, it's totally ridiculous to prevent all FURTHER access from now and forever! I've certainly been sent numerous emails since. And I have numerous accounts linked to that email address. For the sake of a single data loss event, Yahoo will now deny all future access to that email account?! That's rational behavior?

You may ultimately be proven right, but I find it hard to believe this would be Yahoo's reasoning. That's quite a draconian response to a rather straighforward problem. I also can't believe that their terms of service doesn't already provide them more than enough protection against liability for free services.

Impenetrable wall of silence
 

I agree with you that it's hard to know anything for sure in the face of a total silence. It could be a matter of corporate policy, or it could be that they no longer even have any record that your account ever existed, in which case they wouldn't be able to let you back into it even if they wanted to.

It's cold comfort, but all of us out here feel your pain and sympathise with you. It sucks.

Hmm..., had an idea. What if I subscribed to Yahoo Email Plus. It's priced @ $20/yr, but the fine print says I can cancel and receive a prorated refund of the balance. If I upgrade, then presumably I can call in for support should the problem continue (for all I know, maybe the upgrade will "fix" the problem). But at worst, I'm thinking maybe it costs me a month's service charge ($1.67). Heck, maybe I'll even like it and keep it. But at worst, it's like paying $1.67 for tech support.

My only concerns is if Yahoo proves to be as unresponsive to Mail Plus customers as free service customers. I'd hate to have upgraded and still be stuck w/ the same problem and no support! I assume as well that if I cancel the Plus upgrade, my account returns to the free service, not a complete deletion. Just wondering if anyone else has tried this approach?

can't get into my premium email, but can my free one
 

thought I would tell you that I cannot get into my premium email - I cannot even get past their first basic help page - their servers, routers or switches are having issue is the only thing I can figure out. what is so stupid is that I can get into my free email just fine (probably in a different location).

this is not the first time I have had similar issues, but not for much length of time.

To my knowledge the help system for premium email support is the same as it is for the free. so don't switch to premium. just switch to Google emai= gmail.

if you need an invite, let me know and I will invite you = I have about 100 user invites if anyone wants one.

:( Dear People,

I have had mailbox access problems now for over a week. I have sent out numerous "error reports" for all the good it did me. I have had this email since 1996! My virtual life revolves around it. The thought of never being able to use it again induces a near nervous breakdown... However, reading your posts.... hope fails me and I now fear I will have to come to terms with the looming fact that I will have to kiss it goodbye. Curse you Yahoo!

please post help if you can people.

Ps: 1-408-349-1572

Apparently that's the number for ahoo customer services.

Feedback any success and let hope be kindled again.