Cannot Send Mail - the username or password incorrect - help please?

My Yahoo mail account on my iphone which has been working for a year today stopped letting me reply to emails. I can recieve fine but it will not let me reply to messages, comes up with "wrong username and password". I checked in Settings and they are both correct. I have also done the following but to no avaial:

Changed my password to something shorter with just letters
Turned phone on and off
Deleted the account and setup again

If anyone could help I would be most grateful as I have run out of ideas

3GS, iPhone OS 3.1.3, Yahoo mail account

Posted on Jan 28, 2011 4:46 AM

57 replies

SBex

Level 1

4 points

Feb 3, 2011 2:21 AM in response to Mike Floutier

That's better news. Ironically, I spoke to BT Yahoo this morning and they didn't want to know, just said 'we don't support iPhone', end of conversation. I pointed out that it wasn't good enough, all the providers and networks have an obligation to work together for the benefit of their customers! Hopefully now this has been acknowledged, it will get sorted. And why has Apple set up this Support Forum and not read it? Hello? Is there anybody out there?

JLJJJB

Level 1

0 points

Feb 3, 2011 6:04 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I am having the exact same issues. I spoke to AT&T and a very kind Apple representative this morning who informed me it's a problem with the Yahoo server. Apparently, the problem is being worked on. I hope they get it resolved soon!

nnk123

Level 1

0 points

Feb 3, 2011 6:48 AM in response to nnk123

Here is my report to this group... I also contacted AT&T-Yahoo and then Apple support about the issue. AT&T was pretty much clueless (although it is their AT&T-Yahoo server), Apple gave the same advice people on this forum already posted, namely delete Mail account and reset it using "Other". Apparently during this process correct outgoing mail server smtp.att.yahoo.com gets connected. If one adds account using "Yahoo! Mail" in the menu rather than "Other" then it is Yahoo! SMTP Server (no actual details of what it is) and apparently there are some problems with this one - whatever is behind this "Yahoo! SMTP Server" name.

After I reset all my accounts on iPhone and iPad using "Other", e-mail can be sent again. There are several very annoying things though: 1) not all folders come up, in my case I can only see inbox, trash and sent 2) and - this is extremely annoying and inconvenient - even inbox folders are NOT sync'ed with actual web account, i.e. if you delete some of your e-mails on the iPhone they will still be happily present when you open your account on thru the web (and vice versa). Does someone know by any chance how to fix that if possible at all?

I think we should all try to report the issue to the providers and Apple, this way it will be fixed sooner, and previous state of matters restored.

Twoboyz

Level 1

0 points

Feb 3, 2011 7:36 AM in response to travelkitty70

I too would like to contact AT&T and yahoo, but don't know who to contact. I am experiencing the same as others that have posted. My issue started Tuesday. My husband's iphone 3g is fine. Interestingly, I registered his yahoo account on my phone and the same problem happened, but his account works fine on his phone. So is that a server problem, or a phone problem? He has upgraded his software to the new OS, but I couldn't because I kept having errors and it wouldn't let me. Others have posted on another forum that upgrading actually fixed the issue on their phones. I'll go home today and try it again.

I also can't turn off my SMTP Yahoo outgoing mail server. When I go in to try to change information, it's greyed out and I can't change anythign. Two differences I've noticed between my settings and his are the following. Everythign else is pretty much the same.

His phone: Use SSL is on
My phone: Use SSL is off

His phone: Authentication field shows nothing
My phone: Authentication field shows "password" (but I can't go in to do anyting)

His phone: Server port number is something like 476 (that's probably not it, but close. I have it written down at home)
My phone: Server port number is 0.

I'm not sure if these differences are because he upgraded and I didn't.

For now I guess I'll use the workaround of going into yahoo through safari. I don't want to risk losing my folders.

To think I've had this phone and the whole "mobile" experience for less than a year and I can't beleive how much it is crippling me when its not working right.
It's making me a really crabby person. It's consuming all of my energy!

Feb 3, 2011 8:22 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I just got off the phone with Apple. I went through apple.com and had someone call me. No charge. The first woman I spoke with said that they had heard a little about the problem but that the password issue was something new (how some of us have determined that the password length we enter is somehow lengthened or shortened just after we enter it). She forwarded me to a Sr. Manager. He said that the problem is pretty new and that Apple has not yet sent out an advisory to all of its technicians so not everyone knows about it. We went through all of the fixes discussed here and none of them worked. He said that one technician had suggested that to go in and change the account password on your pc and the try and set up the account again on the iphone. That may work for some but my master password cannot be changed and so I cannot try this. The guy I spoke with didn't know if this had been successful but said he had heard about it.

The Sr. technician I spoke with did say that he was uncertain if it was an Apple or a Yahoo problem but indicated that they wanted to take care of restoring service to their customers so he was going to forward the information up the chain to make certain that the engineers who work between Apple and Yahoo are aware. He said to call back if things had not worked themselves out in a few days. We will see...

Feb 3, 2011 8:23 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

PROBLEM SOLVED - My wife's phone had the same issue. She has an Iphone with firmware 3.1 something. A few days ago she could no longer send outgoing email messages. She uses bellsouth.net. An error would pop up and say that either the username or password was incorrect. Tried all kinds of things to no avail. Then, I knew that she hadn't updated the phone's firmare since she bought it last year. The newest firmware version for her Iphone was now 4.2.1. I hooked up her phone to the computer and logged in to her Itunes account. It immediately said that her Iphone needed updating. It backed up her phone first. Then, it downloaded the newest firmware version and added her email account back onto her phone and it works like a charm now.

Feb 3, 2011 8:34 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

Well -- It looks like maybe this problem is solved, but it has nothing to do with downloading a newer OS.
Whoever/whatever got screwed up seems to have been resolved.

An outgoing (test) e-mail stuck on my iPhone for a few days just (miraculously) sent...

Keeping my fingers crossed....

Suela

Level 1

0 points

Feb 3, 2011 8:34 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

It's fixed/___sbsstatic___/migration-images/migration-img-not-avail.png Mine started automatically. It also sent the messages that wouldn't send yesterday/___sbsstatic___/migration-images/migration-img-not-avail.png Yea/___sbsstatic___/migration-images/migration-img-not-avail.png/___sbsstatic__ _/migration-images/migration-img-not-avail.png

Suela 🙂

Feb 3, 2011 8:55 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I do know that yesterday when it wouldn't send outgoing messages on my wife's phone, I added her email account to another Iphone with the updated firmware and it worked fine. After updating her firmware today, it began to work fine. So, if your outgoing mail doesn't start back working, try updating your firmware via itunes.

rickmele

Level 1

0 points

Feb 3, 2011 5:16 PM in response to art_ski_bum

YOu can call ATT at 800 331 0500, option 6, option 3 and then asked to be transferred to the Data Support dept. They will tell you that there is a problem with the Yahoo servers but they wont acknowledge it as an outage until Yahoo confirms it which they havent so far. Who knows why. a workaround is to setup your account using the "other" option. All the fields appear to populate automatically. be sure the "other outgoing server" , AT&T Smtp server is turned on. if you have to add it. the host name is cwmx.com. serverport 25.
You lose folder capability but at least you can send mail until they fix it.
it takes a minute or two for the mail to actually go thru.

tplas28

Level 1

0 points

Jul 20, 2011 7:05 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I don't know if anyone has said this or not but this us what worked for me. If you go to settings, then mail,contacts, calendars, then select your mail account, then the outgoing mail server (whatever it may be, ex. smtp.live.com), then select the primary server, re-enter your passowrd and it should verify it, then go and try to send an email this worked for me.

swh1

Level 1

0 points

Sep 8, 2011 4:01 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I have had similar problems: I have two TalkTalk pop email accounts, 1 gmail and 1 hotmail on my phone. The problem seems to occur for the TalkTalk accounts that I have noticed so far.

I have found that in 'Settings | Mail | Account (TalkTalk account) | Outgoing Mail Server SMTP', that the Primary Server is getting switched off for some unknown reason so the TalkTalk accounts try to incorrectly use the Secondary Servers (smtp.gmail.com or smtp.live.com). Setting the Primary Server (in my case smtp.tiscali.co.uk) back to 'On' solves the problem and mail traffic restarts immediately.

Sep 25, 2011 8:23 AM in response to sarahjanehoayun

I am having that same problem with my email accounts on my iphone 3GS. I have two hotmail accounts, one personal and one bussiness. Cannot send an emai lfrom either one of them since yesterday. Have re-entered the password for both accounts and checked the user name. Anyone have any information regarding this problem? On the plus side at least I am not the only one with this problem

Oct 10, 2011 3:33 PM in response to henricusfromcalgary

Hi...

I've had exactly the same issue with my iPhone 4 but only on 1 of my 2 Hotmail accounts, and totally out of nowhere. I'd not changed any settings, passwords or authentication - it just decided to stop sending emails but still allowing me to recieve them.

I did the following and it worked straight away - clearing my outbox...

Settings > Mail > select affected email account > Outgoing Mail Server > Primary Server > (I selected smpt.live.com > enter email account password (this was showing 'Optional' in this box) > Return/Done > password was checked/authenticated and emails started sending.

I would just make sure you delete any emails in your outbox that you don't want sending before you do this.

Hope this sorts it for you & good luck!

Toolfan

Level 1

0 points

Aug 14, 2012 8:31 PM in response to sarahjanehoayun

This looks like an old problem, but it just happened to me the same way as described above...all of a sudden can't send emails because of an 'incorrect' password on both my Mac and iPhone 4S. I even opened a new gmail account thinking it was my email host (before I saw this chain), and now the gmail is saying the password is incorrect and I just set it up today! Help!

I have tried the fixes in this chain with no results...

Thanks,

Jennifer

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Cannot Send Mail - the username or password incorrect - help please?