Household debate: response timelines

[k3am]

Settle a debate on response timelines in a professional capacity.

One of us claims that it is totally normal to receive a communication (slack, email, text, IM, whatever), either internal or externally facing, and not respond for days.

The other comes from a world where the expectation is that if an email is received by lunch, a response is sent by close of business. If received between lunch and COB, a response is sent by lunch of the next working day, but that at minimum, a response within 1 business day is norm (The response can either be the actual response or confirmation that the message was received and will be receive attention and response.)

What says WP? Acceptable to go multiple business days with no response?

[waverly]

This is field specific and question specific. For some questions in my field, the standard answer time is 24 hours on business days. For example Friday afternoon questions can be answered by Monday afternoon. When DH worked in consulting or even just "business" your second example was more the norm.

There are some internal informational emails that I may not respond to for days if at all. These are not time sensitive issues, and if we don't talk via email we can always talk about it in our weekly meeting. But this is probably only allowed in my industry with this staff because it is considered acceptable on non time sensitive issues.

An example might be our boss sending out the performance review document.  We did talk about it in our meeting and the email was just a written follow up that hey managers need to be working on reviews and here is the document.  I don't think anyone responded to that email as it was informational, and no response was needed.  We responded during the meeting of course since it was in person. 

[sandandsea]

We have a 24 hour rule whereby the expectation of the firm and clients is a response within 24 hours. It’s like that at every firm I know.

[mommyatty]

To or about a client? Within hours. Not days. Internal stuff? When I get around to it. I get a bazillion messages a day. I do my best, but sometimes work gets in the way of email management.

[k3am]

To clarify, generally asking regarding an email that REQUIRES a response.

In this specific situation, the email you’re responding to is an external client.

[mommyatty]

External client? Really damn fast. Definitely not days.

[twinmomma]

External clients bump to the top of the list and get answers in hours. Days is horrifying to me! At the very least, you acknowledge with a message outlining when you'll get the full answer back to them if it's not something you can do right away.

[erbear]

That is not acceptable at my job. Our policy says 24 hours for a response to email (except over the weekend)

[supertrooper1]

I try to respond to external clients within an hour or two. If it's an issue that can't be resolved within a few hours or until the next day, I will respond to the client and let them know that I am still working on an answer. My clients will follow up the next day if they don't receive a response.

I have one client on the east coast that doesn't seem to realize that I'm on the west coast and has emailed me two or three times for an answer before I've even started my day.

[186momx]

Unless specifically stated I would expect to receive something back same day or first thing tomorrow morning.

I'm so frustrated with my payroll tech support right now because when I call in needing helping I maybe get a phone call back weeks later and by then I figured out a work around for the issue myself. At least munirevs tells you when you leave a message that it will take 7 business days for them to respond which is just horrible in my book.

[archiethedragon]

Probably industry specific. I work in construction and knowing what needs to be answered immediately vs what can be answered in 3 weeks is 90% of the battle.

[AdaraMarie]

Hmm, I don't do either as a rule. Client, general, 1-2 days. Client, construction, as soon as possible, minutes to hours, or at least let them know I am working on it. Internal IM, usually within minutes to hours, but it depends. If it is a person I don't have time for it could be a day or two. Internal emails, as soon as I can, but that cam be maybe a week, depending on what it is.

[sdlaura]

External client, definitely within 24 hours, even if it's just a "got it and working on it, and will get back to you"

[dglvrk2]

H and I work in separate industries.Both industries have a general 24 hour response time to emails, even if it's just a "working on this," response. I'm expected to respond to chats (only internal) ASAP.

[livinitup]

Hahahahaha If you think I drop everything twice a day to respond to every type of communication I get from everyone at work then you still check for voicemail messages every day.

Within 24 hours is perfectly reasonable - you’ll either get the answer or get a ‘received, I’ll check” for clients and some people in the office with active co-projects. I expect an answer, question, or action step from co-workers (not everyone on a group email) on emails within 3 days or I assume I fell off your to-do list and then I resend the email (if things haven’t changed or been resolved, etc).

Internal chats are mostly immediate or never - nothing in between. They are informal in my company and basically replace walking up to someone’s desk to ask a question or say - hey, check your email, you’re missing a meeting, are you locked out of the VPN, too,

[mustardseed2007]

I'm an inhouse lawyer and if an external lawyer did not answer me within days, I would tell them never mind don't answer, and I'd ask another lawyer. 

I actually had a lawyer not respond to me for days recently (it took me a couple days to realize she hadn't answered because the question wasn't really time sensitive) and I almost called her firm to make sure she was ok. She never does that! If nothing else it will loose her business b/c I will stop using you if it takes that long getting back. 


Internal client...sometimes I don't answer right away.  

[k3am]

This is our designer for the remodel we’re working on. We sent them a laundry list of questions on Monday. By Thursday, still not even an email confirming it was received and we’d get back to them. I followed up Thursday and got the “we’re working on it” response I would have liked to have had by Tuesday, and their actual response came in Friday evening.

I was pretty shocked that DH will sometimes go 5+ days without even a “received, this will take some time to get back to you” on a message requiring a response.

I get that the timelines I operated under at work are more than most people (nearly everything client facing has deadlines within hours, not days! - if we didn’t respond timely, we jeopardized that clients ability to function) but one business day seems pretty normal to me.