I need my email backed up so aol can unlock my account

Hello? How do I get a phone number for Thunderbird? I want to talk to a human.

Please describe what you want to happen in better detail and why.

What is your operating system?

What version of Thunderbird?

Is this an IMAP account or POP3?

The general process is to copy messages that are stored on the server to a Local Folder, then delete them from the server. The exact method depends on your answer to question 3 above.

This is a forum of volunteer users helping other users. That's all that's available for this free product. There is no phone number.

W140.12.1esr Wi ndows 8 pop3

I am locked out of AOL. They said have Thunderbird backed up your email and call back.

no email since june 12

Hello!

One way is to do a backup of the entire profile. That ensures everything is saved. Here are steps:

BACKUP

1. ensure thunderbird is not running
2. enter %appdata% in search window on task bar and press Enter key
3. this should open windows file explorer in Appdata\roaming folder
4. highlight the Thunderbird folder and copy to external media

RESTORE

1. ensure thunderbird is installed, run once, and NOT running
2. enter %appdata% in search window on task bar and press Enter key
3. delete the thunderbird folder
4. you should be in Appdata\roaming folder , copy&paste the exported Thunderbird folder there.
5. start thunderbird and all should be there

It's still unclear to me what your current situation is. I will make some assumptions - please correct me if I'm wrong...

- You have exceeded AOL's storage limit. I haven't been able to find a definitive answer to what that limit is, whether is number of messages or total size. Do you know?

- Because you have exceeded the limit, you are "locked out". What does that mean? Is that you can't retrieve email with Thunderbird? If so, what error message do you see? Please quite in full and verbatim. Screen shots would suffice.

- Can you get to the AOL web mail page ( https://mail.aol.com )?

- It sounds like you have set POP3 up to download messages to Thunderbird but to leave copies on their server. Right? That would explain how you managed to exceed their storage limit.

- If you haven't received any email in Thunderbird since June 12, does that mean that you have newer mail on their server that you have not yet been able to download?

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If the above is all true, you have already "backed up" as much as you can. It's in the INBOX folder of your AOL account in Thunderbird. That is a local folder and is, effectively, your backup. It would not hurt to COPY (not MOVE) all those INBOX emails to a newly-created Local folder - call it, say, AOL-BACKUP. You can delete that folder later after everything is ironed out.

But please make a safety backup of your whole Thunderbird Profile as described above by david,

What you need to do is delete as much email as possible that's older then, say, June 11 2026 from the AOL server. If you can get to the AOL Web Mail page, you can do this yourself. If you are "locked out" of there and you are working with an AOL technician, hopefully they can do it for you - but make sure they understand that you don't want them to delete anything newer than June 11 or 12.