WHY SWITCH away FROM AOL?

        America Online is built around a consumer services model. They are not intended to act as a business Internet Service Provider like our providers.

        The AOL e-mail system is a proprietary system which does not follow the standard protocols used by most Internet Service Providers. Sometime this causes problems with e-mail handling, particularly attachments like business documents. Moreover, the AOL browser window usually has been notoriously out of date.  Instead, you will usually find businesses using a true ISP so all businesses can use consistent interfaces built on open, common international standards.

        Your business with a custom domain e-mail box can have its e-mail forwarded to an AOL mail box, but what is the usual impact? When you reply to the message, your reply is not from "businessowner@mycompanyname.com", but "someoddscreenname@aol.com", which confuses your e-mail "branding" strategy.

        Don't despair, there is an economical solution. If you (or your kids) like some of the proprietary AOL content, shopping, pop up ads, etc. that are not otherwise available on the web, you can still "have America Online." AOL has a program called "bring your own access" (BYOA) for $9.95/month. This means you dial up to the Internet and to AOL from an ISP like our low cost provider but you can use either standard Internet protocols through our Internet Service Providers or the AOL system with its proprietary features. This way, you can use one of our low cost  Internet Service Provider for business use and AOL for personal use.

This is the AOL telephone number to cancel your AOL account 1-888-265-8008

        If you are not using any America Online content like shopping, pop up ads, etc. that are unique to AOL, just get one of our low cost  Internet Service Provider, cancel AOL entirely and save considerable money over the year.

        In any case, you should give notice to every business contact who has your AOL email address and ask them to use your new domain name address. If you are canceling AOL entirely, you might want to keep it active with BYOA for one to three months to make sure everyone gets the change right.

       Treat your business like a business.