I get asked this question all the time from freinds and colleagues who have paid for the Windows Live Messenger service on their Blackberry and then are surprised they can’t get their Hotmail without opening the WAP browser. Apart from the fact that Hotmail and MSN Messenger are two separate services that are linked together by the email address. I am often asked if someone can send me a MSN later or if I will on the Hotmail after lunch. This has always been my biggest issue with Hotmail and I’ve been a user since day one.
The problem is that Hotmail is a “web only” mail service and does not include the POP3 or IMAP protocol services needed to access your email from a BlackBerry or a desktop client like Outlook and Outlook Express.
Only Hotmail Plus users have access to POP3 mail at a cost of $19.95/year. Hotmail Plus
Paying users also get:
All the benefits of Windows Live Hotmail, plus more:
10 GB of storage
No account expiration
No ads from other companies, just tips and product info from Microsoft
File attachments up to 20 MB—send more photos, more documents, or almost anything you want
This doesn’t look like much, but a standard Free GMail or Yahoo account gives you more for free.
Once a Hotmail plus service is acquired, the user can go here to get the details needed to set up their email on the BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS).
And then finally head over to the Bell BIS page to set up their email:
There are pages for other providers, simply go to the Blackberry.com site and search for “YOUR CARRIER” and BIS. Information on this should also be included in the documentation your carrier puts in the BlackBerry box when you but the device.
The other workaround is to open a free GMail account and have all of your Hotmail forwarded to the GMail address, that way the user still gets email from their hotmail contacts but is able to reply and send new mail without haveing to pay anything else. This option can be a little confusing to set up.