Outlook wont access my bigpond.com account ?

Generate a new Telstra/BigPond app password and use that—not your normal BigPond password—when adding the account to Outlook for iOS.

Generate and use an app password

A closely matching BigPond case—an account suddenly becoming inaccessible and not adding back—was resolved by generating an app password ^1^.

1. Sign in to BigPond/Telstra Webmail in a browser using your normal password.
2. Select the nine-dot menu in the upper-left corner, then Settings.
3. Open Accounts and select Generate App Password.
4. Enter a name such as Outlook iPhone, generate the password, and copy the complete password shown.
5. In Outlook for iOS, open Inbox/profile icon → Settings → Accounts → Add Account → Email Account.
6. Enter the full [Email] address.
7. If prompted to choose a provider, select IMAP.
8. In the password field, paste the newly generated app password rather than your normal Telstra password.

Microsoft documents the same Outlook for iOS path for manually adding an IMAP account ^2^.

If Outlook still reports “INVALID IMAP username and/or password”

Turn on Use Advanced Settings and enter Telstra’s supported settings:

• Username: Your complete BigPond email address, including @bigpond.com
• Password: The newly generated app password
• Incoming IMAP server: imap.telstra.com
• IMAP port: 993
• Security: SSL/TLS
• Outgoing SMTP server: smtp.telstra.com
• SMTP port: 465
• Security: SSL/TLS
• SMTP authentication: Enabled, using the same full email address and app password

These are Telstra’s published BigPond/Telstra Mail server settings ^3^.

Since removing and reinstalling the account has already failed, do not repeat that process with the same ordinary password. The materially different step is generating and entering the app password, including in both the incoming and outgoing authentication fields.

Determine where the remaining failure is

• If Telstra Webmail also rejects your normal password: recover the Telstra username or account access before trying Outlook again ^4^.
• If Webmail works but the new app password fails in Outlook: contact Outlook Mobile Support from the app: profile photo → ? → Contact Outlook Mobile Support. Replies appear as notifications inside Outlook ^5^.
• If the app-password option is absent or generation fails: contact Telstra support, because Telstra controls the BigPond mailbox credentials and app-password capability.

There is no confirmed official notice in the available Telstra material establishing a BigPond outage specifically for the end of October 2026, so test Webmail to distinguish a provider/account problem from Outlook configuration.

References

1. how do i resolve Issues with my outlook account - Microsoft Q&A
2. Set up the Outlook app for iOS | Microsoft Support
3. What are the IMAP, POP and SMTP mail server settings?
4. Recover your username - Telstra
5. Get in-app help for Outlook for iOS and Android | Microsoft Support