Receiving Email

Incoming email settings (Receiving email)
Type	IMAP or POP3	We recommend IMAP but you can also use POP3. IMAP is ideal when using many computers/phones to access email. Read more here.
Port	POP3: 995 IMAP: 993	SSL/TLS is required
Server	mail.aa.net.uk
Username	mailbox@example.com	This is the username to use when getting email and is just your email address. This can also be used as an outgoing mail username if you need one. (Case sensitive)
Password		The password you set on the mailbox. (Case sensitive)

Receiving email means that email is sent by someone else and gets to our mail servers where we hold it for you ready to collect and read. It is also possible to have the email sent direct to your email servers and use us a backup in case your servers or internet connection is down. This is set up using DNS for your domain.

Assuming we are holding your email for you we will hold the email in a mailbox. This is just an email address. The email address is anything you like followed by an @ followed by your domain (or a sub domain if you like). You can set up the mailboxes on our control pages for your domain. You can have as many mailboxes as you like.

Processing Incoming Email

When we receive the email we will check if you have aliases set up. These are rules which mean mail to one email address is sent to another, or to several other email addresses. The can be useful for different email addresses to the same mailbox, e.g. bob@example.com and robert@example.com may want to go to the same person and so the same mailbox. This is also useful for a group email address that needs to go to many people and so many mailboxes. Generally you need a mailbox for each person that receives email. You can set up aliases on our control pages for your domain.

Junk Mail Checking

We check for known viruses and reject any emails that contain one. The other important step we carry out is to check if the email appears to be spam (junk mail). We give the email a score. If the score if very high we reject it. If it is very low if goes in to your mailbox. In between we put [SPAM] in the subject and will put it in your mailbox. Each mailbox can have separate folders and if you have a spam folder we put the likely spam email in there for you. We also delete email from the spam folder after a while to stop it being cluttered up. If you have not seen an email you are expecting check the spam folder. The level that is considered very high or very low is configurable per mailbox on our control pages for your domain.

Running Your Own DNS

If you configure your own DNS and want to use our email service, the top MX to define for incoming email is your domain followed by incoming-mail.co.uk, e.g. example.com.incoming-mail.co.uk. If using our DNS we normally set up MX records for you, but if you have to put these back set the MX record to secondary-mx.co.uk.

Legacy Settings

In July 2017 we changed the server name that customers should use. In the past we were publishing the details below, but from July 2017 onwards the server settings are considered legacy and will be removed in the future.

Legacy Incoming email settings which will be removed in the future
Port	POP3: 110, 995 IMAP: 143, 993	995 or 993 recommended for TLS/SSL, but you may get certificate warnings, so use the NEW settings at the top of this page.
Server	example.com.mail.aa.net.uk	Your domain name (part after the @) followed by .mail.aa.net.uk. However, use the NEW settings at the top of this page.