# Pointless venting about non-responsiveness



## CT (Jan 17, 2019)

...

-end whinging-


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## studiostuff (Jan 17, 2019)

The most difficult lesson for me was learning not to worry about stuff you cannot control. YMMV


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## d.healey (Jan 17, 2019)

Did you check your spam/junk mail folder? (I'm not kidding, I get a decent number of people complaining they haven't received a reply from me and usually that's where it is).


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## CT (Jan 17, 2019)

studiostuff said:


> The most difficult lesson for me was learning not to worry about stuff you cannot control. YMMV



I'm usually pretty good about that! I guess this was just a high concentration of nonsense, and it got to me.



d.healey said:


> Did you check your spam/junk mail folder? (I'm not kidding, I get a decent number of people complaining they haven't received a reply from me and usually that's where it is).



I always do. Zilch.


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## jbuhler (Jan 17, 2019)

Email as a system in particular is completely out of control, and messages that require thought to respond to often don't get answered because they get pushed aside by the flood of other emails, and pretty soon your message has been pushed so far down the queue it won't ever be got to. For that reason, it might be worth sending a follow up to the individuals. For support, there really isn't an excuse. It does tell you a lot about a company's priorities though.


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## patrick76 (Jan 17, 2019)

I would follow up on both inquiries. I know several people that simply won’t respond until reminded multiple times. They might have forgotten, not had a chance to give a proper answer, or they just want you to piss off (hopefully not!), but after some follow ups you may get your answer.


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## R. Soul (Jan 17, 2019)

These days you can't expect a response if you've just sent one email. Even my best friends I often have to email two or three times to get a response.

If you're talking people high up the hierarchy - Hollywood producers etc. it's not uncommon for them to get 200 emails a day. I don't mean spam, genuine emails from clients and connections. With that amount it's almost impossible to answer all.


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## X-Bassist (Jan 17, 2019)

miket said:


> I need to "publically" air something I've found extreme frustrating recently: non-responsiveness.
> 
> The latest case is a developer not responding to a support ticket. That was pretty inconsequential, though, and just the tipping point.
> 
> ...



Not sure how old you are, but I'm in my 5th decade and remember the days when not responding to a phone call or "snail" mail was considered rude. Nowadays I know people my age and younger who regularly ignore texts, emails, voicemails that they don't want to spend the time to respond to. I still feel that this is rude, but I've learned to not take it personally. Even my pastor is so overloaded with incoming emails and texts that responding is rare, and this is even when contacting them about something having to do with church business that is important! They simple miss the email, assume it's an advert, or gloss over it because their favorite relative finally got back to them just before your email came through. For a number of reasons people will put off responding, then within a day or two they've forgotten you've emailed at all.

This is not to excuse any of it. I try to carefully scour my emails and watch for voicemails that are not sales related, but I think I'm now in the minority. Ten years ago most business was done by email, so that there was a printable "record". But now I know many business people who will only call, and will not leave voicemails. They want to talk to the person personally so there can be no ignoring or putting off, response is immediate. Perhaps this is the way to go. Once you find someone that is non-responsive, only use the telephone, and keep calling (every other day?) until you get them to pick up. And then when they do be polite as possible, since you know they may not want to talk about it, but are being forced to. 

In Los Angeles these non-responses are even more common. People don't want to deal with saying "No thanks" and the fallout from that (Either the person wants details on "why?" or tries to convince them to change their minds), so they don't respond. Keep trying but be sensitive to when people become annoyed, be ready to move on. It's an unfortunate side effect of all this added communication these days (emails, texts, voicemails, facebook, twitter, etc) that people are starting to ignore personal communication and treat it like a twitter post or group text, where non-response is not rude. I hope these attitudes change.


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## CT (Jan 17, 2019)

I hate the idea of following up, because I don't want to be a nuisance, but it's probably true that given some peoples' attention spans and the amount of junk flying around that you have to be in their face a bit.



Polkasound said:


> Your email to this acquaintance was neither short, nor business correspondence. It was a chit-chat email.



You're correct, it wasn't short, nor was it business, but it was not remotely what I'd call "chit-chat," and definitely not akin to the example you gave, although I don't want to get into a semantics debate.



R. Soul said:


> If you're talking people high up the hierarchy - Hollywood producers etc. it's not uncommon for them to get 200 emails a day. I don't mean spam, genuine emails from clients and connections. With that amount it's almost impossible to answer all.



All due respect to the parties involved, I doubt they're dealing with more than a dozen emails a day, if that.



X-Bassist said:


> Nowadays I know people my age and younger who regularly ignore texts, emails, voicemails that they don't want to spend the time to respond to. I still feel that this is rude, but I've learned to not take it personally.



I agree with your whole post, here. I guess what galls me more than anything about this is that I can't imagine myself ignoring earnest correspondence, even if just responding with something as simple as a polite "good luck." I do get what you're saying about why some people might even avoid this, though. It's too bad.

Anyway, I kind of hate that I put something this personal and whiney on here now... sorry, VI-Control.


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## Polkasound (Jan 17, 2019)

miket said:


> You're correct, it wasn't short, nor was it business, but it was not remotely what I'd call "chit-chat," and definitely not akin to the example you gave, although I don't want to get into a semantics debate.



I wasn't implying your email was as idle as the examples I gave, but if your email was neither short nor important to the operation of this person's business, it may have fallen into his "uggghhh" category. Sometimes I get emails like yours where someone needs advice. I do answer them, but not always in a timely manner.




miket said:


> I can't imagine myself ignoring earnest correspondence



I commend you for this. I used to be more like that early on in my business, promptly attending to every correspondence with equal enthusiasm. But as I've gotten older, correspondence has simply become work. So I prioritize it: business and family matters come first -- everything else can wait.




X-Bassist said:


> Nowadays I know people my age and younger who regularly ignore texts, emails, voicemails that they don't want to spend the time to respond to. I still feel that this is rude, but I've learned to not take it personally.



I agree completely. The norms regarding correspondence are changing. Ignoring correspondence is like wearing pajama bottoms and flip flops in public -- it's just what so many people do now. There are plenty of us who find it rude, but it's so commonplace that the best thing we can do is not take it personally.


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## Jimmy Hellfire (Jan 17, 2019)

I don't mind people not responding to emails etc. I mean in private situations. Everyone should have the right not to.

But I expect goddamn companies who took my money to respond to support tickets that I wouldn't have made in the first place if they hadn't screwed up something that worked before. For example companies who's name starts with Stein and ends with Berg!


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## dflood (Jan 17, 2019)

Polkasound said:


> The norms regarding correspondence are changing. Ignoring correspondence is like wearing pajama bottoms and flip flops in public -- it's just what so many people do now.


I guess it's my age. When I get a text message, I always feel the need to acknowledge it, often just with a thumbs-up emoji if I don't want to encourage any further reply. For me it's the equivalent of saying: 'Roger that' when using a marine radio. Otherwise, we don't always know if the message has even been received, let alone being dealt with.

Much of customer support is about managing expectations. I think almost every online business can benefit from some sort of ticketing system to help deal with communications. I don't mind getting an auto reply, particularly if it contains some sort of human response-time pledge that is later honoured. It may not reduce the workload, but it makes sure customers don't fall thorough the cracks and it gives the customer some sort of reassurance that they are being heard. In the event that a customer is communicating about a common issue, it gives the developer/vendor some time to accumulate similar issues and perhaps develop a common response. Otherwise it's just whack-a-mole.


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## ghostnote (Jan 17, 2019)

Welcome to the real world. Some people just won't bother. Especially in the US. I know it can be hard to acknowledge that. Not every man is a gent and most of them don't know nor recognize certain rules of behaving. It's the guys you let before you in the line because you see they are in a hurry. They see this as weakness and don't even say thank you. 

A famous person once said: "... forgive them, for they know not what they do."

Either learn to deal with it or try to be persistent if it's really worth the struggle.


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## novaburst (Jan 17, 2019)

Jimmy Hellfire said:


> Stein and ends with Berg!



That name rings a bell its on the tip of my tongue, ah yes is this the developer that makes bass guitars


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## CT (Jan 17, 2019)

ghostnote said:


> Some people just won't bother. Especially in the US. I know it can be hard to acknowledge that. Not every man is a gent and most of them don't know nor recognize certain rules of behaving.



Yeah, I bet some of them even use dismissive phrases like "welcome to the real world."


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## dzilizzi (Jan 17, 2019)

In my job that pays the bills, some days I get nothing, other days I get a lot of emails, mostly junk stuff. When I'm gone for a few days, it really piles up. And I miss stuff. You may want to send a second email after a reasonable amount of time in case that is the situation. You also may want to put a read receipt on it. Some email addresses may not be checked often. 

I do miss the form letters people used to respond with when we wrote letters. That way, you knew they got it even if they have no intention of answering you. I guess there could be an auto response, but most people don't use that. I do usually get one from customer service when I put in a request.


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## NYC Composer (Jan 21, 2019)

In business, I give it a couple of shots then give up and write it off. If it's personal and I'm blown off numerous times, I like to think of it this way: "You're dead to me."


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## Fredeke (Feb 4, 2019)

I was tempted to not respond to this, but obviously the joke would have been lost on everybody.


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## Daryl (Feb 4, 2019)

I faced a case of having paid for a couple of software licences, and having contacted support eventually got them, a few weeks later. Except they were the wrong ones..! Numerous ignored emails later, including one quite snotty one, I gave up and contacted the LA Better Business Bureau. Magically, as the deadline for reply approached, I got an email telling me how install the licences, which had magically appeared in my iLok account a few minutes before. Needless to say, there was no apology or even acknowledgement that they had screwed up. Terrible customer service, but at least I know how to get action from that company, if I ever buy any of their products again.


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## Fredeke (Feb 4, 2019)

Jimmy Hellfire said:


> For example companies who's name starts with Stein and ends with Berg!


Steinwavesberg ?


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## CT (Feb 4, 2019)

Fredeke said:


> I was tempted to not respond to this, but obviously the joke would have been lost on everybody.



This made me laugh.


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