I have been told that someone has sent me a message on my old e-mail address, how do I open my old address so that I can view it and more importantly how do I close it permanantly to ensure that this never occurs again?

need more information is it somewhere like hotmail/gmail?

log in using your old access details.

these sites do delete inactive accounts though so it may well have just been lost to the ether.

You can close accounts on the popular web based email clients but it wont stop people emailing it in the same way as cutting off a phone line can stop people ringing it. They may get a "message undeliverable" email back but thats the best you can hope for.

Alternatively you can set up email forwarding to push any emails from the old address to the new one .

As i said, more specific advice would require more info.

It's on "Microsoft outlook" I do not want items forwarded from it I just need that one message then it would be good if messages where then returned "message undeliverable"

As cd.thomson says, you might be able to close it permanently but that won't guarantee someone won't still send email to the address. just like you can tell the post office you have moved won't stop people sending your mail to your old address.

Microsoft outlook is an email client not an email host. your email host is the bit after the @ so like yourname@hotmail.com would be hosted by hotmail and yourname@btinternet.com would obviously be btinternet hosting it.

Who was the host for your old email? do you remember the password to access the account? (DON'T post it here if you do)

Who is your current host?

Sorry to appear to be thick on this subject but IT is just not my subject. My old address was @Wanadoo.com

Not heard of them for a while, aren't they owned by Vodafone or TalkTalk now?