This morning I had an e-mail from a business guy asking about how and when one should use Return Receipts (RR) due one of his associates making this request with every single e-mail that they sent.
Personally I think this feature is pretty useless — more annoying that functional. Return receipts are a way of knowing that an e-mail has been opened on the recipient’s computer. It does not however, mean the opened e-mail has been read.
It may be useful in business communications when one individual wants to confirm that a communication has been received by the recipient. While some may become annoyed at this request, feeling it is intrusive or a form of babysitting, I see no problem with it. In the work environment there is no expectation of privacy and if someone, say a supervisor wants to confirm you have received an e-mail, simply acknowledge your receipt and go upon your business.
Do you have someone in your life who has this feature on for every single e-mail? I’ve found those are the folks that seem to want to know when you receive their e-mail even if the content is not critical or important – sorta a control thing. Or, folks who do this sometimes do not even know they have this option selected.
Nicely e-mailing these onliners with a “Did you know…..?” informing them that this is not a feature to be used for every single casual e-mail, instead more for special situations where it is important (not curious) to know an e-mail has been received, may help them understand how to better use this feature.
The recipient has the right to determine when/if they want to read an e-mail and reply to it. RRs should be reserved for those instances where it is critical to knowing the e-mail was received/opened. Such instances would include legal, time-sensitive and important business issues.
I know when I receive RR requests, 99% of the time I decline. It is none of anyone’s bee’s wax when I opened any particular e-mail. That said, when it is an important matter and I can understand why there is an RR requested by the other side, I go ahead and give my approval. But come to think of it, I don’t even remember the last time I actually approved an RR.
I use RR for legal issues and important company matters where I want to have some sort of proof or trail to document that an e-mail was sent and subsequently opened. I’ve never found a reason to use RRs with personal e-mails to friends or family.
The bottom line? To send an RR request for every day-to-day business e-mail, is simply not necessary (or appreciated) by recipients.
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Interesting post. I run a PR agency and, in the professional services sector, we sometimes have clients who claim they didn’t receive e-mails when we follow up with them about where things are in the approval process. When the RR feature became available, we started to use it as proof that we had indeed fulfilled our part of a project but it caused more trouble than it was worth. Now we trust people, and if they say they didn’t receive something from us, we just forward the original with a kind note.
Hey, Louise:
Thanks for the great comments! You experienced what I did back in the day too. Folks receive e-mails and sometimes don’t know it (it’s in their trash or filtered to a different folder) because a great many simply do not make the effort to understand not only how e-mail works but how their e-mail software works. If they state they didn’t receive — saying you have an RR doesn’t change that POV.
What I do when I sent attachments or information that are that important, I put the e-mail I sent in my “To Do” folder and have it colored coded as a Follow Up. I then follow up in 48 hours to see if they have any questions. That then confirms their receipt and reflects unexpected extra customer service that my clients love!
At your service,
Judith
agreed, i think it is a weird technology that needs to be phased out. I don’t think it really matter when you open something or whether you open it at all. it has no bearing on whether you will reply or not. its a neat feature i guess if you want to bog down your world in extra useless gadgets, but not necessary.
Hey, Jordan!
Thanks for stopping by! I agree 100% — RR really doesn’t serve any purpose other than to be annoying or intrusive. You’ll never know if your e-mail was in fact read — so what is the point?
At your service,
Judith