Microsoft’s Support Email - Don’t wanna listen!
You have an issue with your hotmail account, so who do you contact? Well, obviously Microsoft. But what if they didn’t want to listen?
A few months back my hotmail account was hacked into, using an exploit apparently found in versions of Microsoft Windows Live Messenger (and yes, it was updated). Unfortunately I couldn’t remember the identity question so I was forced to contact Microsoft directly for a resolution.
I emailed Microsoft’s Live ID assistance crew from my wildit email (my personal email), who replied within 48 hours. The major part of the email was this:
Since you are unable to utilize the options to reset your password online, I am pleased to inform you that we can help you by giving you the instructions that you need to reset your password. Please reply to this message using your webmaster@miccas.net account, and include the following sentence in your response: “This is my e-mail address and I would like to reset the password of my Windows Live ID.”
This is the point where I got excited, Microsoft actually did have an answer for me and I would actually get my hotmail back! However, this is where everything started going wrong.
I promptly responded to the email, changing the account from my wildit one to my main webmaster@miccas.net account as requested by Microsoft. Within 10 minutes however, I received this email:
This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.
Delivery to the following recipients failed.
LV_ID.WNLV.NA.US.EN.SYK.MNL.TS.T01.SPT.00.EM@css.one.microsoft.com
The email also included 2 attachments. One being the message I had sent, and the other was a file called details.txt which contained this:
Reporting-MTA: dns;ext-imc-02.partners.extranet.microsoft.com
Received-From-MTA: dns;TK5-EXHUB-C101.redmond.corp.microsoft.com
Arrival-Date: Fri, 30 Mar 2007 02:19:29 -0700Final-Recipient: rfc822;LV_ID.WNLV.NA.US.EN.SYK.MNL.TS.T01.SPT.00.EM@css.one.microsoft.com
Action: failed
Status: 5.1.0
Diagnostic-Code: smtp;554 5.1.0 Sender Denied
My first thoughts were that they have blocked my email, so I decided to email them once again, however from the wildit account which had been working.
Their next response couldn’t have been any worse.
I understand that you are unable to reply using your other account due to a Delivery Status Notification error message you encountered. I can imagine how inconvenient this must have been for you and I look forward to providing you with the necessary assistance.
Michael, when you reply, please make sure to use the same subject on this e-mail, as it is being used as a filter in our system. We will not receive your e-mail if the subject has been changed or omitted.
Furthermore, I am requesting you once again to reply to this message using your webmaster@miccas.net account, and include the following sentence in your response:
“This is my e-mail address and I would like to reset the password of my Windows Live ID.”
Now I can assure you that the subject line was kept intact, and with further emails just like this with Microsoft blatantly blaming the issue on me, I decided to open a new ticket straight from my webmaster@miccas.net acccount.
BUT, guess what? I lodged the ticket and what do I get in the mail?
This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.
Delivery to the following recipients failed.
LV_ID.WNLV.NA.US.EN.MSF.SEA.TS.T01.RTG.00.EM@css.one.microsoft.com
After about another 5 email back and forth, I finally asked that the issue be raised further and that the supervisors are alerted of my ticket. Within 5 days, I received an email entitled “Reset You Windows Live ID Password”. Well, the joy that had overcome me was just amazing. Nearly 2 weeks had passed and I had finally unlocked my account.
So, you’re wondering why I’m still complaining? It’s because the email that I had received was actually for a different account, not my hotmail account which was blocked.
Now further emails to Microsoft are just being ignored. Emails from my wildit account aren’t being responded to, and my webmaster@miccas.net account is still bouncing back.
To this day, nearly 2 months past and my hotmail account is still under the control of somebody else and Microsoft aren’t lifting a finger to help.
Had an issue like this one? Comment below, I’d love to hear your comments.
May 28th, 2007 at 8:16 pm
try getting a reverse resolving IP address or email VIA a smarthost that does.
June 11th, 2007 at 2:08 am
i forget my msn psavord yesterday,hacher give this,i need new pasvort this email tul_yilmaz@hotmail.com
please give me in the my new msn tulayyilmaz.tr-bg@hotmail.com ,send me my old msn pasvord here please
and thank you very much
June 18th, 2007 at 5:20 am
I am just going to ramble on for a minute or two as i have 10 minutes on my hands…
I had a problem of a simular nature. I contacted Micro$oft because the shared server which hosts my email account had been blocked by Micro$oft mail servers so I was unable to send mail to hotmail/msn/live users. I contacted Micro$soft (quick point - finding a Micor$oft page with contact details is quite a task, infact a project all on its own) to advise them of my situation and to ask for guidence. I can appreciate that the millions of pounds worldwide that are wasted on processing spam emails. I can also appreciate that someone needs to set a new benchmark for email servers to reduce spam on the internet HOWEVER surely not at the cost of whole servers being blocked. Anyhoo moving back to the point. I contacted Micro$oft and received a friendly email telling me it was my fault and i should learn how to send emails using correct headers and content (not quite as dramatic as that, but words to the same effect). And if required more assistance to reply to the email address. Filled with rage i slammed the reply (as instructed) button and began sharing my feelings with them. Now keeping in mind that in my support ticket to Micro$oft i advised thay my server was NOT ABLE to send email to any Micro$oft address … can you guess where this is going… Message REJECTED. I could drone on all day about what happend next but long story short, If you use anything microsoft, consider Linux or google (he says writing from IE7 on Windows 2003)
June 22nd, 2007 at 9:51 am
Same problem same recipient-
LV_ID.WNLV.NA.US.EN.SYK.MNL.TS.T01.SPT.00.EM@css.one.microsoft.com
No help…. I wish this was easier, this is just rediculos the help you get from Bills team.
Is there an easier way? or is there someone else I can talk to about this? Anyone know anything? Please help
Thanks in advance
May 5th, 2008 at 5:29 pm
I had the same problem when reporting spam to the hotmail abuse address. I found a web page where you can report such problems and got a reply from Microsoft that they reject EVERY mail from systems which do not support SPF!
September 4th, 2008 at 7:22 am
i forget my pasvort of my msn can you reset my pasvort valmiri.85@hotrmail.com