11. These were the settings up until about August 2016. At that point Microsoft stopped managing Telstra's email, and Telstra went back to managing it themselves. Of course the process was poorly

managed, probably a result of being poorly conceived to begin with.

Originally posted on 2015-11-27

Updated on 2016-09-04 to reflect changes made by Telstra. Try jumping straight to step 12 if you have received an email from Telstra telling you that your email is ready to be migrated.

Updated 2016-12-24 to show Telstra IMAP account settings. Try jumping straight to step 13 below if you want to use Telstra's preferred settings which are for IMAP rather than POP.

What is the difference between IMAP & POP? (Courtesy of the Bigpond website)

IMAP and POP are two different protocols (methods) used to access email. Of the two, IMAP is the recommended option when you need to check your emails from multiple devices as IMAP always syncs with Telstra email servers.

Please note, IMAP is only available for customers using the new Telstra Mail platform

A good example of the difference is when you read your emails. If you’re using IMAP and mark an email as “read”, it also gets marked as read in all of your other inboxes. This won’t happen with POP as emails are downloaded to your specific computer or device and any changes you make on that device won’t be reflected in the Telstra servers and across other devices or computers.

If you’re switching from using POP to IMAP you’ll need to be mindful that any folders set up with POP will be lost when you change to IMAP. To keep these folders, we recommend logging into Webmail and re-creating them before transferring.

Executive Summary for IMAP accounts

1. In Thunderbird – Incoming server type is IMAP 

2. Incoming server name:   imap.telstra.com   –   Port 993   –   SSL

3. In Thunderbird – Outgoing server type is SMTP

4. Outgoing server name:   smtp.telstra.com   –   Port 465   –   SSL/TLS preferred 

    (or try Port 587 with STARTTLS)

I will leave steps one to twelve below for the sake of completeness, but you may as well just look at Step 13 if you need to set up your Bigpond account as an IMAP account in Thunderbird.

1. Go to the Bigpond Webmail page and log in using your email address and password

How to set up Bigpond email in Mozilla Thunderbird

Let me know how you went with these settings. Did they work for you? Can I edit the steps to make the process easier to follow?

Send me an email if you've got a moment, using the form below.

7. Those first six steps have set the groundwork for you to now be able to get your Bigpond email account working in Thunderbird. Open Thunderbird and from the top menu, select Tools > Account Settings

2. When you have logged in you will see something like this:

10. Thunderbird will try to work out settings for your account, but will get it wrong. No matter what it suggests, you will need to click on Manual Config to correct the settings.

6. Once the Connect Devices and Apps with POP screen opens, choose Enable for POP, and in the lower section, decide whether you want to allow your devices or email programs to delete messages. Considering the amount of junk mail we all get, I suggest enabling your apps to delete messages. Then click Save.

Dig​ital System Support Services

The login page you arrive at may also look like this:

8. When the Account Settings window opens up, choose Account Actions on the lower left, and then Add Mail Account. (Of course, if you have already been trying to get Bigpond working with Thunderbird, the mail account is probably already there, and may just need a bit of editing).

4. Click on the gear icon to change settings, and choose Options

9. Fill in your name, email address and password, then click Continue

12. These are the new server names and port numbers as at August 2016. For the outgoing mail server, try Port 465 with SSL/TLS first. If you don't have any luck, try Port 587 with STARTTLS.

This tutorial is probably relevant for accounts established after February 2012

The Telstra Bigpond website has fairly helpful instructions on how to set up your email using various versions of Microsoft Outlook including 2000, 2003, 2007 and 2010, as well as Outlook Express (for anyone still using Windows XP) and even Mac OSX Mail, but for some reason they don’t cover Thunderbird.

Here are the steps you’ll need, including the not so obvious ones that probably brought you here in the first place. In fact, the first six steps are probably the only part you need to see, as they are almost certainly the bit you didn’t know about.

Detailed Steps

5. In the Options menu, find Connect Devices and Apps with POP

Executive Summary for POP accounts

1. Enable POP for your account on the Bigpond outlook.com webmail site
2. In Thunderbird – Incoming server type is POP3 – Port 995 – SSL/TLS – Normal Password
3. In Thunderbird – Outgoing server type is SMTP – Port 465 -SSL/TLS preferred - Normal Password

13. These are the new server names and port numbers for Bigpond IMAP accounts as at December 2016. For the outgoing mail server, try Port 465 with SSL/TLS first. If you don't have any luck, try Port 587 with STARTTLS.  

3. On the right hand side of the browser window you will see your Username and a gear type icon for changing settings: