These links will take you to other pages within this section:
Account
Setup | Community
Resources | Links
These links will take you to other sections of our website:
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On this page, links to just about everything you’ll want to know about your new Internet account.
Account Features | About Phone Accounts § | Where to Find Help | Dialer/Email Configurations
Make the SoVerNet site your browser’s start (home) page:
To get the most out of your Internet account, be sure to familiarize yourself with our Terms Of Service and our Acceptable Use Policy, as these govern your use of our network and your access to the Internet and online services such as email. And, remember that all our services are covered by our 30-Day Money Back Guarantee.
Terms of Service§ | Acceptable Use§ | 30-Day Money Back Guarantee§
Account Features—basic info about your account features, web services & options available with your account, the online tools for account management, and info about your email service. Note: pages that are not within the text site, or open new windows are marked with §.
Where to find help— We have an extensive online Support section, as well as live Tech Support available Monday through Saturday 8 AM to 8 PM, by phone (877) 877-2120 or email. Other commonly used email addresses are below:
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| By email: support@sover.net accounts@sover.net hostmaster@sover.net webmaster@sover.net customer-service@sover.net |
Online:
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By phone: (877) 877-2120
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Dialer/Email Configurations—How to set up your dialer for accessing the Internet & your email software for using our email service. Also, a reference for server names. Also listed below are the names you will use for our servers. For example, to set up a newsreader, you'll be asked the NNTP server. Email programs need the incoming (POP) and outgoing (SMTP) mail server names. You'll use the web servers' names when uploading files to your webspace.
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WHAT’S INCLUDED?—Included in your account are these basic features:
Each account includes a selection of features from which you may choose $15- or $45-worth of options with which to customize your account. Single-User Dialups, Residential DSL (“PHSA–Plus” or “PHSA–Basic”), and Small-Business Accounts include the $15-range; Multi-User Dialups, Full-Time Dialups, Business DSL and up include the $45-range. You may drop features in order to add others more useful to you while remaining under the free inclusion limit. If you exceed the account’s free limit, but still wish to add the feature(s), the monthly charge is simply added on. All fees in excess of the pre-determined level are subject to discounting according to whatever bundle discount you may have in place. Give us a call if the choices perplex you, we are more than happy to help you decide what best fits your needs, at the best price.
feature options: Intermittent
Dialup Accounts
PHSA (dialup features for PHSA-Plus only) | BHSA
for more overall account info: Intermittent
Dialup Accounts | Full-time
Dialup | PHSA | BHSA
more on: Web/Hosting, FTP/SQL space, mapping, & Virtual Web Address | top
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VACATION MODE—Vacationers can put Personal High-Speed Access and residential phone service accounts into a temporarily inactive state at reduced monthly rates. Note that with PHSA-Plus’s included Dialup Access & National Roaming capability, you might find it more convenient to use them than to deactivate your PHSA-Plus account (see “Roaming”). The minimum Vacation Mode period is 1 full calendar month, maximum is 6 months in any 12-month period. When suspended:
To ensure retention of your username, or if you wish to have email access while away, consider the following options:
back to Features
ANTI-VIRUS PROTECTION—It is essential these days that you take responsibility for protecting your machine from infiltration by the malicious code proliferating throughout the Internet (“worms,” “Trojan Horses,” or “viruses”). These bugs are designed to sneak in via email, file downloads, visiting a website, or just by exploiting an online weakness in your operating system. The majority of these nasties are aimed at Windows users—Mac users have a few, but not nearly as many. The only defenses are:
Links for anti-viral software, and other anti-virus information may be found on our website on our Anti-Virus page. NOTE: spreading viruses can subject your account to suspension; continual reinfection can subject your account to termination—per our Acceptable Use Policy.
You can choose how you wish to deal with email that our server-level anti-virus filters tag as suspect. Use the “Advanced Options” page of the Spam Controls, and scroll down to option numbers 15 & 16. Read the details about these, and the other options in the Controls, in our Spam FAQ. Note that the server-level filters won’t snare everything, and will provide no protection against worms & viruses delivered via websites, file downloads, CDs or other means.
Anti-Virus page | Acceptable Use Policy | Spam FAQ | Spam Controls
SPAM CONTROLS—Spam filtering is on by default. There are 2 other levels of filtering available, as well as an Opt-out feature, on the first page of our Spam Controls. The “Advanced Options” page has several user-configurable settings for spam filtering, and a couple of options you can set for our server-level anti-virus filters. Read about the various options, including how to setup your Accept and Reject Address Lists, in our Spam FAQ. No system is 100% accurate, so we advise that you set the Controls to allow you to check messages before they are deleted so you don't lose something important.
We also recommend that you use your regular email software’s built-in filtering abilities to further sort your mail to catch unwanted mail that slips through. This 2-pronged approach works best because your email client can be set to look for words in the body while the server filters generally work with the header and Subject: line information. Details on setting up your email’s filtering options, and info on using the Spam Controls, may be found in the Spam Control FAQ. The FAQ also has some additional resources for reporting & tracking spammers, as well as links to anti-spam software.
Spam FAQ | Spam Control Login | Eudora filtering rules | Outlook filtering rules
SPAM BLOCKING SERVICES—If you choose to use one of the services that sends a verification request to each sender, we advise you to add certain SoVerNet administrative email addresses to your acceptable list as we cannot respond to each verification request we get.
To be sure that you receive announcements we send that may contain info affecting your account, to receive email responses from support, for anything affecting the use of your Internet access through SoVerNet, you should be sure to add the following email addresses to your acceptable senders list: customer-service@sover.net, support@sover.net, accounts@sover.net, hostmaster@sover.net, repair@sover.net, abuse@sover.net, webmaster@sover.net, sales@sover.net. These addresses should take care of just about any communication we would initiate, or respond to your inquiry from.
For some reviews of anti-spam software and links to software packages, see the Spam FAQ
ADDITIONAL EMAIL ACCOUNTS—All accounts come with the option for multiple “Email-only” accounts. The choice of how many is entirely up to you. As long as the total of all user-selectable features remains at or under the cap for your account type, there is no additional charge. If you wish to add email accounts beyond the account cap, the monthly fee of $1.50 each is simply added on, subject to any discount in place. Email-onlies require the username & password of the primary account for logging on, but have their own separate email name & password for accessing mail. Email-only users can access some of the online Account Tools (change password, etc) by logging into the Tools interface with their email username & password.
contact Accounts Dept. | configure email software for multiple accounts
configure
email client for multiple accounts
back to Features | top
EMAIL FORWARDING—You can set up forwarding yourself via the WebMail interface. Just login with your username and password and look for "Forwarding" under the Options menu. When you wish to remove forwarding, login and turn it off. Mail arriving before forwarding begins will not be forwarded, so give your account a last download after forwarding is set to be sure nothing’s left waiting. Note that forwarded mail bypasses our server-level spam and virus filters, so you’ll need something setup on the receiving account.
set up or remove email forwarding | see Vacation Mode
REFERRAL CREDITS PROGRAM—You can earn yourself a bit of credit, and our thanks as well, by referring your friends, family, acquaintances to us. We will apply a $40 credit (per Dialup or residential phone service referral) or a $100 credit (per DSL or business phone service referral) for each new customer who comes to us via your recommendation. High-Speed Access (DSL) customers should note that, since your lines have qualified for PHSA or BHSA service, it's quite likely that your neighbors' lines also will qualify. The Fine Print says that they must maintain a fully paid account for at least 2 months before the credit is awarded. The only thing you must do is to be sure they give us your SoVerNet username or SoVerNet telephone number when they sign up. This ensures that the proper account gets the credit. Note: only one credit per referral.
USING WEBMAIL—You can access your email anytime/any place, as long as you can reach the web. Just point the browser to our “Home Portal” page, click on the Webmail login link, and enter the email username/password for the email account you wish to access. Our WebMail is an implementation of the "Open Source" SquirrelMail program. You can configure it to suit your preferences—it uses cookies to retain your settings.
With WebMail, you can read, compose, reply to, forward, and delete messages. You can save drafts of messages, and copies of sent mail, and you can set all incoming mail to forward elsewhere. Note that forwarding all incoming mail to another account causes the mail to be sent on before it can pass through our spam & virus filters—it never reaches your Inbox—so those functions will need to be enabled on the receiving account. Messages in your Inbox have been spam/virus checked and can be manually forwarded elsewhere. SquirrelMail includes an addressbook, and a “Vacation Response” message option. Attachments sent via SqirrelMail have an 8MB limit, so you may need to Zip or Stuff larger files, or send them via your normal email software program.
Mail will be kept in your Inbox until you download it to your desktop email client. If too much accumulates, and your 10MB limit is reached, new mail will be bounced back to the sender until you delete stored mail or add more storage space. Note that messages in your Drafts folder, Sent Mail folder, and Spam folder also take up storage space. Those folders should regularly be emptied (move any you wish to keep to the Inbox folder for downloading via your regular email software, or forward elsewhere). In terms of any important drafts, sent mail, or received mail that you store in WebMail folders, note that you are responsible for maintaining any backup copies you might need—we do not guarantee the availability of files for restoration from server backups.
The Spam folder is automatically emptied once a day, on a first-in/first-out basis; depending on when you check it, you may find it temporarily contains more mail than the level you set in the Spam Controls. Spam filtering is on by default, so you should check the Controls and the folder to be sure legitimate mail is not being deleted as spam. You can accept the default settings, or click the “Advanced” button and set to your preferences; there is also an “Accept/Reject” list option to which you may add addresses to always accept or reject. Filters typically require tweaking periodically in order to keep up with spammers’ efforts to by-pass them. Our server-level filters are periodically tweaked for this reason, and you’ll often note an increase in spam as the filters relearn the updated rules.
more info: the Spam FAQ § | Spam Controls Login §