Air Force’s ‘e-mail-for-Life’ stabilizes Airmen’s addresses Published Feb. 17, 2010 By Angela Cutrer 81st Training Wing Public Affairs KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. -- While Airmen tend to move across bases and across the world, their e-mail addresses seem to get lost in the shuffle. That has changed now that the Air Force has E4L - e-mail-for-Life. It's an effort that created a single, persistent e-mail address for the life of an Air Force member's career. The new program is the first step in fielding an Air Force enterprise active directory and exchange capability. "Your Air Force career is defined by the type of position, so if the member is active duty, his e-mail address remains the same for the length of his active duty career," said Capt. Cieara Carson, 81st Communications Squadron network operations flight commander. "If the same member separates and returns in a different status such as a civilian or contracted employee, then a new e-mail-for-life address would be assigned, and would remain persistent during the life of that particular career." According to the Web site https://e4l.afds.af.mil/faqs.aspx, users must be in a population associated with the Air Force, including active duty, reserve, national guard, civilian, contractor, presidential appointee, foreign national, nonappropriated funds employee and academy student. The user must also be registered in the Defense Manpower Data Center where the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System application is used. User registration is completed when the user is issued a common access card. Department of Defense contractors will not receive an E4L address; only Air Force contractors will, the Web site noted. In order to do this, the site said that users' CACs must reflect "Air Force Contractor." A new CAC issued as an "Air Force Contractor" corrects the DMDC record. The Web site said that a forwarding e-mail address is created by linking DMDC information to the Air Force Global Address List information. There are two criterions for creating a link between DMDC and AFGAL information: The first criterion is to match the electronic digital interchange-personal identifier from DMDC that is stored on your CAC to the EDI-PI stored in the AFGAL. The second criterion is to match the e-mail address received from DMDC to the e-mail address in the AFGAL. If multiple e-mail addresses are matched in AFGAL, then the most recent address is selected. Because Keesler was the first base to migrate into the Air Force Network, members who leave Keesler for assignments to other bases may find they are not within the AFNet structure yet. If the Airman moves to a nonmigrated base, mail will need to be forwarded. The E4L address still functions, but the user may need to ensure the E4L address is set up to forward to the new local base mailbox. Users should change the field called "The email address your email will be forwarded to is" to reflect their new local e-mail address, which will address the nonmigratory issue, Captain Carson said. As you receive e-mail communication from personal contacts and automated notifications systems, see if those sources are using the correct information. Send a short note to people who may have the incorrect information stored in their e-mail address listings to request they update the address. Visit the Web sites of systems that send automated notifications -- such as personnel systems, MyPay and LeaveWeb -- to update your information using the self-help tools available. Contact your system support entity when updating isn't possible through self-help tools. While organizational mailboxes are not considered "E4L" addresses, mailboxes at Keesler are now hosted on the AFNet mail site and have us.af.mil addresses as well. Unit points of contact should ensure the same care is taken to update information for organizational accounts, Captain Carson said. During in- and out-processing of a permanent change of station move or equivalent, the system is updated with a new address to forward messages, the site said. New messages sent to the E4L account are forwarded to the new @base.af.mil account. Messages previously received are not. "While the Web site states that the system is updated with a new address to forward messages upon a PCS move, I would still encourage people to visit the site once they have their new base e-mail address and validate that the update has been made and is correct," said Julie Noakley, 81st CS network operations work center chief. Find answers to questions by reading "how to find your us.af.mil address" at https:/ /e4l.afds.af.mil/faqs.