AKO Email expiring Jan 14 and instructions

[skydivr]

For all my fellow AKO account holders:

------------
The Army is extending the deadline for retirees and family members to
access their AKO email account to 31 January 2014. Previously, this
deadline was 31 December 2013.

Secretary of the Army John McHugh signed a memo in April 2013 to begin
transitioning Army Knowledge Online to next-generation enterprise services
and to meet increased security requirements. The Army transitioned its 1.4
million official business users to DoD Enterprise E-mail (DEE) and will no
longer sustain legacy AKO infrastructure.

Army retirees and family members need to transition from AKO email to
commercially available personal email accounts. AKO recently enabled these
users to forward AKO email to a commercial address.

After access to AKO email ends, the Army will close all retiree and family
member AKO email accounts and delete all stored email. AKO will continue to
forward e-mail until 31 December 2014 for those users who enable this
function.

To ensure continued email service, retirees and family members should:

-- Obtain an email address from a commercial service (e.g., a .com or .net
account).

-- Access all accounts and memberships currently using the AKO email
address, such as myPay accounts, and update them with the new commercial
address. (The Army uses the email address in the myPay account as the
official retiree contact.)

-- Save messages, contacts, and files to a personal computer by downloading
them from AKO email. To do this, first create an IMAP account in Outlook
for the AKO email address (instructions here:
https://ako.us.army.mil/suite/doc/41665914). Then create .pst files of the
information to be saved (instructions here:
https://esd-crm.csd.disa.mil/app/answers/detail/a_id/507/kw/pst).

-- Obtain a premium DS Logon account. This account allows access to
personal benefits records and claims on DOD and Department of Veterans
Affairs Web sites. Instructions for creating a DS Logon account are here:
https://ako.us.army.mil/suite/doc/41665910

For additional information, visit AKO's Migration Page for Retirees and
Family Members at https://www.us.army.mil/suite/page/682479 or the public
AKO Transition site at <http://www.eis.army.mil/ako>.

[rero360]

The switch over to the mail.mil email has been a pain in the butt, there have been times where I haven't been able to check my mail for weeks at a time, nothing like going thru 150+ emails at a time, most of them being USPFO outage alerts and retirement announcements.

[Todd00000]

The switch over to the mail.mil email has been a pain in the butt, there have been times where I haven't been able to check my mail for weeks at a time, nothing like going thru 150+ emails at a time, most of them being USPFO outage alerts and retirement announcements.
OWA email and the cloud sucks, over here our internet speed is too slow to interrogate the CAC so we can't log on.

[ramairthree]

yeah, the AKO email was not great, but beat this OWA system.

Literally at the moment I retire no more non-CAC/retiree AKO access. Not sure what I would need it for, but you just know that kind of stuff comes up where you do.

The main thing I cannot figure out is they wanted me to register an account at the My VA or E benefits or something. It would only let me register by CAC because I had a CAC. It would not let me register by name and password. But when I turn in my CAC for a retire card what will I do, can't figure out trying to change over from CAC to password.

[Wake27]

I'm not sure if its just my computer, or the mail.mil system, but I get prompted to reenter my CAC PIN constantly. Not in set intervals or anything, but in 5 minutes I'll probably have to enter it at least 3 times, plus every time I open a new email or window.

[rero360]

You're not the only one Wake27, same thing happens to me.

[DragonDoc]

yeah, the AKO email was not great, but beat this OWA system.

Literally at the moment I retire no more non-CAC/retiree AKO access. Not sure what I would need it for, but you just know that kind of stuff comes up where you do.

The main thing I cannot figure out is they wanted me to register an account at the My VA or E benefits or something. It would only let me register by CAC because I had a CAC. It would not let me register by name and password. But when I turn in my CAC for a retire card what will I do, can't figure out trying to change over from CAC to password.

I went through this not to long ago. EBenefits and VA will not be an issue. Just make sure you use the same password for all of the sites you will register on. MyPay will be an issue since you can't direct logon from AKO.

[DragonDoc]

Did anyone get this to work on Outlook?

[Wake27]

Anyone know how to get web.mail to work with a new CAC? It worked with my last one but not this one. I've been combing the web for the last several hours downloading certificates and googling. I can log on to AKO with it, just not the damn webmail.

[kry226]

Make sure you're using the email certificate when you log in. When the window listing both certs on your CAC pops up, choose the one that says "email."

[Wake27]

Make sure you're using the email certificate when you log in. When the window listing both certs on your CAC pops up, choose the one that says "email."

I could've sworn I tried that... Thanks.

[kry226]

I could've sworn I tried that... Thanks.

Did it work?

[Skyyr]

Sonuva...

[Wake27]

Did it work?

Yup. Thank you.

[kry226]

Yup. Thank you.
No problem. Glad it worked.

[ramairthree]

This is a huge CF for me.

I have a CAC for about another month, but on multiple different browsers it will not let me register for a DSL logon, and more often than not cannot check enterprise email. For the DSL, it asks for the pin a dozen times then says there is an ssl connection error..

[kry226]

This is a huge CF for me.

I have a CAC for about another month, but on multiple different browsers it will not let me register for a DSL logon, and more often than not cannot check enterprise email. For the DSL, it asks for the pin a dozen times then says there is an ssl connection error..

You should only be able to use IE. Try using the compatability view if you're having issues, and on the latest IE 11, you have to add the mail.mil to the compatability list. You should also make sure your CAC reader and associated software, etc. are installed properly as well.

[rero360]

I've only been able to log on with my CAC using IE and Chrome. I normally use FireFox but it doesn't work, so the only time I have Chrome open is to check my MyPay and mail.mil account.