The iCloud IMAP server “p99-imap.mail.me.com” rejected the password for user XXXX

I get the message: "p99-imap.mail.me.com" rejected the password for user XXXXX ocassionally. It happened a lot when iCloud first came out. As time goes on it has become less frequent and it's probably been a month or two since I last saw it. I don't think it has anything to do with passwords and everthing to do with server issues at Apple's server farm. My suggestion is to wait a few hours. Get your email from a browser or phone/pad until it comes back up.

For the record I am getting the same error message. This has been happening over the last 5 days on and off. Really frustrating.

This problem IS solved by deleting your mail accounts, going to iCloud and changing your password and then re entering your mail accounts. Whatever the cause this solved it for me with no recurrence.

Still happening...completely unable to access mail on my iMac for the last 2 days. And yes, I have deleted the account, changed the password, and re-entered my email account.

I simply refuse to change my password, because I did that some months ago as per Apple's recommendation.

I've got an iPhone, iPad and two Macs running on my Apple ID, PLUS iTunes store.

It's up to Apple to solve the mess, not up to us as customers to find ways around the problem.

I do get my mail on iPad and iPhone (as well as via webbrowser), although now and then the same "wrong password" crops up. Then I go to Settings -> my account -> click Done and it's OK. Pain in the butt but at least I can get my emails.

Both my Macs can't get email, and not only that: since I changed my mail from MobileMe to iCloud, all my messages disappeared in my Mail.

It's clear that the Password is NOT the issue. It is their server.

I've sent two feedback reports to Apple. Just hope they react.

To my knowledge this is a growing issue; my imap access stopped working two days ago (I can access email only through iCloud web) and now two colleagues have the same issue. And I am surprised Apple hasn't provided more info in this issue.

From what I see this happens periodically to many users since October '11!!

I had the same issue I deleted the email account first with no change then finally after changing the password and adhering to the password rules, it has solved the problem. It would have been nice for Apple to make this piece of information known instead of having to scour the Internet for a solution. I purposely waited to move to icloud until now so all the kinks would be worked out. Wishful thinking it would go smooth. I supose I will have to go and change my apple tv now too.

The one thing Apple does not tell you, unless you dig for it, is that they now require your password, iCloud or not, to contain at least one capital letter and one number.

Go here: https://appleid.apple.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/MyAppleId.woa/ and reset your password. You can even keep the password you had, providing that you already had at least one number in it, and simply change one of the letters to capital. Otherwise, add a number as well.

This changes your main Apple ID password. Give it an hour or so. Then from all your devices, put the new password in. Mail reapperared and everything is fine again.

Don't ask me why they didn't simply make it a line item in the list of requirements to move to iCloud... I mean, how hard would that have been? Duh.

I googled this:

iCloud Password

and I got this result (1st line)

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2617?viewlocale=en_US

Took 30 seconds

Csound1 wrote:

I googled this:

iCloud Password

and I got this result (1st line)

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2617?viewlocale=en_US

Took 30 seconds

And that page contains an advisory for creating a secure password. It does not categorically state that you MUST have a capital letter and a mix of numbers and letters in your passord to use iCloud.

My current AppleID password is just seven letters, all lower case and no numerals. I have never been asked to change it and never experienced any issues using it. I have used it since .Mac days.

I can find nothing other than on the Discussions board that says it is a requirement of iCloud that the password MUST have a capital letter and a mix of numbers and letters.

*EDIT*

Actually I have now found something that refers to password requirements but the way it is worded implies that it only applies to new accounts or passwords being changed on old accounts. I think this needs to be clarified by Apple.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1728

Message was edited by: rustyintegrale

I see a lot of people have this same problem but not so many share their solution. This worked for me after I switched to iCloud from MobileMe and my mac-mail stopped working.

Go to system prefs and MoblieMe. Logg off under the setting here. Go to iClound under system prefs and select the email back on. Then go to the system prefs "Mail,contacts and Calendars". Here you just put in your password. Should be emty when you get in.

That solved my problems. Hope this helps others too.

At least you'll know why your password stopped working, when it does.

I have been having the same problem on both my Mac mini and my MacBook. I get the error message at least once a day. Usually, it happens every time I "wake" the computer up from sleep mode or from the screen saver. I've read through the string and the puzzling thing to me is that my Apple ID password already has (and always has had) lower case and upper case letters, numbers, and even an "special character." So, it seems to meet the "requirements" that are specified. Yet, I keep having this problem.

The following worked for me (but not straight away).

I had the password request pop up starting on 3rd April (having had no previous problems since migrating to iCloud several months ago) on 2 computers. (The response was 'moved'.) The mail settings in mail preferences were not touched since the auto migration from mobileme to iCloud, but they did not quite match what Apple say they should be. The incoming server was mail.me.com (rather than imap.mail.me.com) and the username was just the first part (missing the @me.com).

I changed this on one computer yesterday but it did not seem to have any effect. However, today (5th) it was working but not the other computer. I changed that to the new setting as well and it is also now working.

My guess is that there has been some change at Apple servers that no longer works with the abbreviated settings yet these were the ones the auto migration had left.

Thanks for the idea, charismapud. I checked my account settings in Mail, however, and, for the iCloud Mail account, the server name already has "imap" in it. (The full server name is p01-imap.mail.me.com.) Also, it's greyed out, so it doesn't seem like you can change it. The good news is that I haven't gotten the error message today...yet.