Or is this terrible etiquette!!!

Exactly @WrongSwanson

I am quite surprised how many people think they have the choice to only open up their e-mail when they want to.

Honestly OP you are fine and need to not give yourself a hard time about this.

While I do understand the urge to be more considerate about not burdening people out of hours with additional work, I think this "email etiquette" thing has swung too far in the wrong direction and become a bit silly.

I've seen this on other threads where people have reprimanded posters for sending emails and in a couple of cases posters have said it could lead to disciplinary action at their places of work FFS. It's absolutely right and sensible not to bully people into responding out of hours but there's nothing wrong with sending emails out of hours. I would physically not be able to do my job if I was barred from sending emails outside of office hours. I'm on calls most of the day and I simply wouldn't be able to get it done if I were restricted to an "emails only during office hours" policy.

No one is held at gunpoint and forced to read emails out of hours. She can ignore it if she wants to.

And presumably at work, where I receive emails from 1000s of different people over the course of the year, I should check with each one when it would be convenient to "schedule send" their email for? Because of course some may work nights, or have small children or all kinds of other preferences.

Or maybe it would be simpler if we all just send and look at emails when convenient for us, and don't look at them when we don't want to deal with them?

Of course it is. Presumably the staff are going to "schedule send" so I only get the emails at the time I want them too (outside working hours) or is this a one -way etiquette?

*What do the people suggesting this think parents do all day? DH and I are both in the kind of jobs where we often barely manage to nip the loo all day, never mind sending emails about the children during working hours.

I expect most professionals get emails at all kinds of hours. The onus is on us to manage when we check them and respond.*

Well to be fair the conversation is more around staff behaviour, so not emailing each other evenings and weekends and not replying to parent emails in our own time. We can't really dictate what parents do.

However, if there's a general rule about only emailing during working hours it's easy enough to just do a "schedule send" on most devices now isn't it?

No problem at all @lizrta I asked for a copy of an invoice from a certain company the other week ... (I emailed at 4.15pm on the Monday.)

The bloke from the company sent it just over 33 hours later, at 1.00am (in the very early hours of Wednesday morning.)

It didn't bother me, as I didn't see it til 9am (8 hours after.) It didn't wake me or anything. I don't see any problem at all.

Only one time did I get wound up. I had bought an item from ebay on 1st December last year, and it hadn't come by 11th (when it was meant to be here.) It was for a gift for someone, so I asked when it would be here. The seller never responded to my message, so I messaged again 3 days later. (Now 15th December.) Still nothing.

I messaged ebay around 18th December, and asked what I could do as the seller had not responded, and the item was still not with me. Ebay gave me a refund within 2 days. Got no item but I did get the money back. I never asked for a refund, they just gave it me.

Then I got a ping on my mobile phone - a week later - on Christmas day afternoon, when watching a lovely festive film with my family after we'd had Christmas lunch. It was an email from this bloody seller. 'Why have you asked for refund? You never gave me chance to answer.' (I fucking did!) 'Answer with haste please, as I am not happy ebay refunded you.'

CHRISTMAS DAY at 2.30pm he messaged me. Now THAT was a piss take. I never responded. I just blocked him and put my phone on silent. But I was fuming for about half an hour. I thought 'what a twat!'

tl;dr you did nothing wrong @lizrta

What do the people suggesting this think parents do all day? DH and I are both in the kind of jobs where we often barely manage to nip the loo all day, never mind sending emails about the children during working hours.

I expect most professionals get emails at all kinds of hours. The onus is on us to manage when we check them and respond.

😁

We're having big conversations in our school about whether emailing outside work hours should be banned.
But my take on it it this...nobody has to reply to an email immediately, that's the beauty of them. Read it, have a think and get back when you're ready.
But
Many people choose to reply to emails in the evening because it's easy (I often reply to emails in my phone in bed) and it stops work piling up (well helps a tiny bit)

As long as you're not firing off multiple emails every day and expecting an immediate answer then I think you're fine 😊

Why should the op avoid doing it in future? If you are not supposed to deal with email out of hours, just turn off notifications. Don't try to dictate to others how they choose to use the email tool.

Exactly.

When I am at work, I don't have time to think about any issues with my own dc nor have the time to be able to e-mail any of my dcs' teachers if I needed to. So I do that, at a time when I am not at work and therefore am able to do things for my family. Obviously, as I am sending an e-mail and not phoning someone or knocking on their door, it is designed that the recipient can choose to read it when it suits them. I don't expect anyone to read it just because I sent it at a particular time.

When I was teaching, sending me an e-mail in the morning wouldn't have a hope of me seeing it until that evening anyway - I'd be prepping for the day when I got to school.

I am a 'professional' I work nights.
It's poor form to send me emails during the day.

?

I tend to assume "professionals" are smart enough to know when they do or don't want to check their work emails

I couldn't care less when someone emails me.

I'm afraid I think it's you who is being obtuse. I never said I can't use it. I can but I generally don't.

I don't expect others to adapt their perfectly normal use of a tool to suit my preferences as I am capable of using the tools in a way that suits me. Equally, it is unreasonable of others to expect me to adapt my perfectly normal use of a tool to suit their preferences.

Quite aside from anything else, your diktat assumes that professionals prefer to only receive emails during business hours and that their working hours fit in to a pattern that matches their business hours.

I send emails when it's convenient for me to send emails.

If teacher doesn't want to answer emails then presumably she just won't check her inbox.

I have no idea who has emailed me since 4pm. I haven't looked.

I use it. But I also know to only check my emails when I want to deal with them, as I don't expect others to remember to.

It's not a binary thing

You’re just being obtuse now ! Learn how to use it . It’s easy 😎!

Agreed

It's very poor form for a professional not to be able to figure out how to use a tool as simple as email in a way that suits themselves and to instead expect the world to adapt to their preferences.

Also just wondering why it's only professionals it's unacceptable to send emails to outside their business hours? What about the plumber? Is it OK for me up email him when it suits me? Or my cleaner?

It’s very poor form to send a message to a professional outside of their work hours because you cannot use a function as simple as ‘Schedule Send’ !

I wouldn't mind when a parent sends an email, but I wouldn't reply until the morning (if I even saw it before then).

My school tells staff not to send emails between 7pm and 7am... because if even a few teachers do, that sets a parental expectation. ("Why don't you reply overnight, when Miss X does?")

Of course it makes a difference to the sender. You have to remember to do it. Then if it's not something you normally do, you have to figure out how to do it. Of course you then also need to know the preferences of the recipient. Maybe they prefer to deal with email in the evening.

The onus is on the person who doesn't understand the nature of email to figure out how to deal with it in a way that suits them rather than expecting the world to adapt to their preferences?

Why not ? Makes absolutely no difference to the sender but MAY make a difference to the recipient .

Why? It's up to the recipient to use email in a way that suits them. Most of us manage it quite easily. It is an asynchronous tool.

Surely just use ' Schedule Send' !

*Teacher here. That's not the point. At my school we're not really even supposed to receive emails from colleagues in the evening or at the weekend, never mind parents. This is part of the school's commitment to reduce workload and improve work-life balance, though it's a drop in the ocean tbh. Yes of course we work out of school hours, but we can decide when we do that.

Don't feel bad, OP. Just try to avoid doing it in future.*

I don't agree with this.

We are discouraged from emailing colleagues outside working hours but wouldn't expect clients and third parties to know this and most people outside our organisations (whether school or nursery or whatever) are emailing in their own free time and can do so when they like.

It's your obligation to manage your own time and when you read your emails.