Dear Members, It is imperative that we have an email address on your account that is actively used/checked by you.  Many of our system notices (such as statements, receipts, late notices, etc.) are sent to a general "contact" email address on your account. By default, when you signed up for IntouchMI.com service, an email address was created for you (username@intouchmi.com) and that email address is automatically entered as the account contact address.  Many of our customers do not use this email address or may have changed their email address that is used for primary contact. We have added a feature in the customer management interface that will now allow you to update the email we have attached to your account.  It is very important that everyone take a moment to be sure to update this address. I have added a link on the left column in the "Account Links" section ("Update Email") that will take you to this part of the interface.  You will need to log in to the account manager once the new window opens. If anyone has any questions, please feel free to contact us. Sincerely, Charles Partridge Intouch Internet Services, Inc.

Dear Members,

Many of you have expressed your opinions related to the modified version of the advertisement for the music of Mike Clinesmith on this page.

I have removed the animated advertisement and put the original version back on the page....with no music.

Thank you for your input.

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Intouch Internet Services, Inc.

 

Well, it took much longer than expected, but the credit card processing has been brought back online as of approximately 7:30PM.

Our credit card processing software is currently offline.  During planned modifications to the software, issues arose that are going to require technical support from the software vendor.

Calls have already been placed to the vendor and a resolution is expected by mid-day today.

Thank you for your patience.

Effective November 1, 2007 we are adjusting our technical support (helpdesk) hours to the following schedule. Monday thru Friday: 9:30am - 6:00pm Saturday and Sunday:  Closed This change is being planned as a temporary one; however we do not have an estimated date for when the hours will expand once again.  Updates will be made when changes occur.

Dear Members, I am very happy to announce that the current owners of Intouch Internet, Inc. and myself have come to an agreement that has allowed me to purchase the assets and services of the company. Over the next few days and weeks you will notice minor changes to the formal company name on things like our websites, invoices, receipts, etc.  The company will now be known as Intouch Internet Services, Inc.  Not much of a change, but I feel it better describes what we do. There won't be a whole lot of changes right now, our plan is to continue working at the goal of improving our services and growing our company.  I'm very excited to finally have full control of the future of IntouchMI.com and will do my best to keep making improvements. Please feel free to send any comments, criticisms, questions, etc. directly to me via our responses@intouchmi.com mailbox. As always; Thank You for your continued Patronage of Intouch Internet (Services)! Sincerely, Charles Partridge

Dear Members,

There are still a few members that are using "newsgroup" services.  As of today, we have changed our provider for these services which may require you to make a change to the newsgroup software interface you may be using.

In the past, this service has required a username and password authentication to use the service.  The new provider handles these permissions by IP address.  You may need to change that setting in your software (just remove the user/pass authentication option in your settings).

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our helpdesk.

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations

Effective October 1, 2007

Intouch Internet is discontinuing the annual prepayment discount rates for all dial up service plans.

Any customer who has been receiving an annual discount for prepayment of a dial up service rate plan will now begin receiving a invoice stating the standard monthly rate for that plan beginning on your next bill date.

Example of what to expect:  If a customer paid for annual service at the discount price on 9/1/2007 (for the billing period of 9/1/2007 to 9/1/2008) then the next time they receive a bill on 9/1/2008; the monthly rate will then be in effect for that customer.

We are sorry for any inconvenience that this may cause any of our customers; however at the current service rates and extended features being offered, it is simply necessary for us to do this at this time.

If anyone has any questions regarding this change, please feel free to contact our helpdesk department.

Thank You,

Intouch Internet, Inc.

Intouch Internet now offers High-Speed Internet Access options from HughesNet.  HughesNet is brought to you by HUGHES the global leader in providing broadband satellite networks and services.  For over 30 years, Hughes has delivered satellite products and services around the world, with more than 1 million systems shipped to customers in over 100 countries!  Hughes pioneered the development of high-speed satellite Internet services, which it markets globally under the HughesNet brand.

Intouch Internet has long suffered from the lack of ability to continue servicing our customers who wish to move to a higher speed internet service and now feel that offering HughesNet satellite internet service will help fill that gap.  We've spent a lot of time researching the options that best fit our customer base; while also eliminating the confusion of multiple types of services and carriers for the different geographic areas we serve.  We feel that partnering with HughesNet is a best option to accomplish our goal of providing the services our customers want.

HughesNet has several different options for customers to choose from starting at $0 up front!

Click HERE to see more info, and to signup for HughesNet service!

You can even give us a call at 1-866-929-3278 for more info.

Dear Members,

This is just an update regarding a few things:

1.  Please note our new helpdesk support hours are as follows:

Monday thru Thursday - 9am to 8pm
Friday - 10am to 6pm
Saturday - 10am to 4pm
Sunday - Closed

2.  I'm still trying to work out a solution for the multi-city weather box that doesn't kill the load time of this site.  Hopefully a solution will soon be found.

3.  We've updated our on-hold music to something new.  I've located a local composer, Michael Clinesmith, and made a deal to license the use of some of his original music on our phone system.  If you like what you hear, please feel free to click on the advertisement located on the left column of the page here and help support this local talent.

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations,
Intouch Internet, Inc.

Dear Members,

I tried to implement the new weather box fully (about 35 Michigan cities in the list) today, but now that it's as big as it is we're seeing detrimental page loading delays.

For now, I've removed the new weather box so that the page load speed goes back to normal (probably even a little faster than it has been for the last month or so).

Back to the drawing board, but fear not, the feature will return!

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations,
Intouch Internet, Inc.

About a year ago, we expanded our service offerings to include statewide access. In the time since; we've added a rather large customer base throughout the state.    more »

Dear Members,

"You've received a greeting postcard from a xxxxxxx"

If you have received an email with the subject line similar to the above sentence (the "xxxxxxx" could be many different words like 'neighbor', 'colleague', or 'family member') MOST LIKELY IT IS BOGUS AND COULD BE HARMFUL IF YOU TRY TO VIEW THE "POSTCARD".

To be sure, if the email contains a link to view the card that consists of "http://" followed by a series of numbers (ie: http://123.456.78.90), IT IS NOT LEGITIMATE.

Here is the notice being displayed at the *real* greeetingcards.com website:

NOTICE: Someone has been fraudulently sending emails to people using our site name. If you received an email stating you have received 'postcard from a family member', please do not open it, just delete it. The email was not sent by us and you are not on any lists with us. We are aware of the situation and are looking into it further. Telltale signs are that the address they send you to to pickup the card is a numerical address rather than greetingcards.com or birthdaycards.com.

If you receive one of these emails, PLEASE DELETE IT IMMEDIATELY.

Thank You,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations,
Intouch Internet, Inc.

In case you haven't heard the news, The Flint Generals hockey team is now under NEW ownership!    more »

As of yesterday afternoon the Charter.net email issue has been resolved.    more »

Since implementing our new email interface and server back in March we've had several issues with the new system. In mid-April I posted an article that informed you all of the steps we are/were taking in our troubleshooting efforts to resolve the stability issues going forward ( you can read that article here:    more »

Dear Members,

A recent news item (from right here in Michigan) pointed out just how devastating it can be to fall for a Scam email.

You've probably heard about the "Nigerian Scam" emails that have circulated the internet for almost a decade, apparently no one told this man about them in time:

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070118/NEWS06/701180305

 

I thought this would be a good article to share with you all. I've listed several different reporting sites so you can choose which version of the report you want to read:   more »

Dear Members,

Maintenance completed.

On Saturday May 26th between Midnight and 6AM, a performance upgrade will be occurring at our Network Operations Center facility by a team of technicians from Alcatel-Lucent. 

They have informed us that there will be downtime of about 1 hour during this service window.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may be and Thank You for your continued patronage of Intouch Internet.

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations,
Intouch Internet, Inc.

 

UPDATE - Service was restored at 6:12PM and has been working fine since.   more »

All went well and relatively smooth with the install of the power strips today. Most services that were impacted were only down for a few minutes at the most.    more »

Since the update to the new mail service, there has been no option for users to setup a "vacation" or "auto-respond" message in the mail interface. For now, this feature is not being planned for implementation due to issues it causes with Spam.   more »

I spend a lot of time talking about "Spam" email in respect to all of the junk stock alerts, Canadian pharmaceutical offers, etc., but it hit me today that I've been leaving out one of the biggest problems; Hoax Emails.    more »

Email had an issue again this morning. We are very sorry for this. Please understand we are doing everything we can to determine what the problem is. Here is where we are in our troubleshooting efforts:    more »

Completed Successfully.

You know, this is the luck of it!  I post an article (see below) that defines the evils of Spam and the Spammers...and a few hours later we experience an email service interruption.

Coincidence?

Anyhow, mail servers have been undergoing emergency maintenance for the last couple hours and things are starting to clear up.

We hope to have everything back to normal very soon.

Thank you for your patience.

Sincerely,

Charles Partridge
Director of Operations,
Intouch Internet, Inc.

In the past I've posted articles about how to help protect against Spam but never really felt that i put my words together well enough or explained the background of Spam to the extent it deserves.   more »

The Generals won an EXCITING game Friday night for us! This game was the only Sold Out attendance during the regular season as well as it was the longest game all year. We might have even experienced the longest 1st period in Generals history...it sure felt like it!   more »

We've discovered a way that we might be able to reduce the amount of spam many of you receive!    more »

Newly updated policies and service agreements were posted today and a more expansive menu option was added on the left side navigation menu to accommodate these documents.

Them darn "difficulties"! :)    more »

Originally I posted our target date for the new email server and interface to go "live" by February 21st. We are going to move that date out to March 1st in order to allow us more time for testing of the configuration.    more »

Today I received a VERY official looking spam message that you all need to be aware of. The message appears to be from PAYPAL as a confirmation of a purchase made using my PAYPAL account at eBay for a *DELL* computer.   more »

I thought I'd share some of our testing with you related to the new email interface we are working on.    more »

Dear Members, We were notified this week of a major security vulnerability in a primary Cisco router at our Network Operations Center.    more »