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Original poster

Tell me your work email disasters - make me feel better.

127 replies

Craicademic · 28/04/2023 16:57

I just signed off an email to a group of about 15 people - including three members of my senior management team - with "Enjoy weekend head".

Fuck.

When I realised my mistake, I just ran away and closed my emails down for the weekend. I'm now drinking wine.

I keep going all hot when I remember my mistake.

Please make me feel better.

OP posts:
helpfulperson · 28/04/2023 17:01

What did you mean to write?

I actually doubt any of them will notice - we tend to read what we expect.

Not me, I was an innocent bystander but I was once in an email chain that had various discussions and people added and one of my colleagues was a bit surprised to read right through the chain and find a bit near the start where someone had specifically said that he was not find out about something.

FictionalCharacter · 28/04/2023 17:03

Many moons ago, when email was still a bit of a novelty to most of us and before spellcheckers were a thing, I sent an all-company email that happened to contain the word "counting", but I left out the O.
Message recall wasn't a thing then either.

quietnightmare · 28/04/2023 17:03

😂 brilliant.x being dyslexia I wouldn't have even notice and anyone that does probably just thinks mean mean 'ahead' not head and won't even give it a second thought. Plus it's Friday so everyone just wants the working day over with and likely didn't even bother reading that part and won't be giving it a second thought they are in weekend mode.

Not an email mistake I made but once giving a presentation in you over is Ty to a full lecture hall of my peers I said 'orgasm' instead of 'organism' and the whole hall erupted now that was horrendous and turns me hot whenever I think about it shudder

Original poster
Craicademic · 28/04/2023 17:11

I meant to write "Enjoy the weekend ahead".

I added something about hoping for sun and then took it out. I added something about it being the first of three long weekends and then took it out. So I fucked about with it deleting and inserting things and eventually got to "Enjoy weekend head".

OP posts:
Original poster
Craicademic · 28/04/2023 17:12

@sovielverloren Amazing!!!

OP posts:
Purplepjs · 28/04/2023 17:16

On my first day at work I emailed 4000 customers an email that said nothing but ‘stuff, stuff, more stuff’!!

I had been sorting the formatting and written that in to save a text box and sent it instead.

Rhythmisadancer · 28/04/2023 17:18

First week as a trainee solicitor I meant to email my mum, but in fact sent a message to a whole load of my new colleagues telling them that my boyfriend was away for the weekend and did they want to come over?

JosieOhNo · 28/04/2023 17:24

Rhythmisadancer · 28/04/2023 17:18

First week as a trainee solicitor I meant to email my mum, but in fact sent a message to a whole load of my new colleagues telling them that my boyfriend was away for the weekend and did they want to come over?

Probably a little better than if it had been an email to your boyfriend saying parents were away, did he want to come around... I'm guessing that email would have been a bit spicier 😂

Okki · 28/04/2023 17:25

I slipped on the stairs at work and grazed my ankle. Hot boss who had just done his first aid course wanted to patch me up. I hadn't shaved my legs so was dying of embarrassment. Obv had to share this story with my BFF, so emailed her. Except I mistyped her email address and sent it to corporate HR group email instead.

Original poster
Craicademic · 28/04/2023 17:25

@Purplepjs I feel like most work emails might as well say that TBH.

@Rhythmisadancer Amazing. That's really sweet, I bet a few of your new colleagues were smiling at that.

OP posts:
Original poster
Craicademic · 28/04/2023 17:26

@Okki Brilliant, at least you didn't send it to Hot Boss eh?!

OP posts:
Cantwaitforsummertime · 28/04/2023 17:32

One firm I worked at, an HR bod sent out a message about the toilets being out of order. But instead of saying they hoped it didn’t cause any inconvenience they typed they hoped it didn’t cause any incontinence. You could hear the laughter going around the office as people opened the email and read it. I still laugh about that now. Best typo ever.

Whattown · 28/04/2023 17:44

@Craicademic this has really made me chuckle and no doubt all the recipients, if they notice. I am sure on Tuesday you will come back to some lovely funny replies. Don't stress, it breaks up the banality of working life.

snowydays10 · 28/04/2023 17:46

Don’t worry that’s not that bad! I joined the “theatre ticket group” at a bank and somehow managed to forward my reply asking for 3 tickets (didn’t read the email properly which said they only come in pairs) to the ENTIRE bank. Thankfully the guy next to me managed to retract the email for me but it did reach a large amount of people working for this very large bank!

FisherThem · 28/04/2023 17:51

My friend emailed the foreign affairs team in a Washington DC embassy about their "pubic affairs" rather that "public affairs"

MandyMotherOfBrian · 28/04/2023 17:54

I’ve fessed up to this one on MN before but…
In about 2000 I’d just moved to Manila as the manager of large department of software developers. They were re so friendly and welcoming that in my first department wide email I thought I’d give it a go and address them in Tagalog. Turns out instead of the ‘Hey Guys!’ vibe I was going for I accidentally wrote the equivalent of ‘Hey Whores!’ . Problem was they were so polite they didn’t want to tell me. They weren’t offended but they felt bad for me and actually had a get together to discuss it and nominated someone to respectfully let me know. I, obviously, styled it out…😁

dietcokelime · 28/04/2023 17:55

I'd been messing around whilst drafting an email on a call, I'd joked with my colleague and changed my email signature to read...

Slowly losing the will to live and any fucks to give,

XXXXX

I forgot to change it before sending it. I got a call from the very senior person I'd sent it to

a) to perform a welfare check
b) to laugh at me

Luckily we've now got a fab working relationship, but I did mentally draft my resignation letter when I realised what I'd done 😂

REP22 · 28/04/2023 17:56

Not me, thankfully, but a colleague once sent out a local government press email far and wide, including to Councillors and Elected Members announcing the achievements of our newest Countryside Ranger. Without the "o". Many doors slammed in the corridors of power that afternoon.

Another boss once shipped a very expensive bit of kit destined for a Spanish customer to Switzerland.

I once tried to pay in a (mercifully unused) sanitary towel with the work cash at the bank because I was ogling the hunky bank employee on the help desk. I only realised when "sorry, I don't think we accept those" was spluttered by the poor girl at the desk.

Happens to us all, OP xx

JustDanceAddict · 28/04/2023 18:04

Today I sent someone an email addressing them as their deceased mother - because I was looking at her name & not the recipient’s 🤦‍♀️
I did send an apology email when I realised.

MargaretThursday · 28/04/2023 18:26

One I did early in a job:
I was sending a formal invite out to around 100 people.
I'd got it all composed, then the caretaker came and asked (ordering paint) how to spell "emulsion". I can't spell out loud so I typed it at the bottom of the invite... and then sent it out.
So it said something along the lines:
"Please find attached the invitation to our fundraising ball on the 3rd of December.
Emulsions,
Margaret"

One person asked if it was a secret password, but everyone else ignored it. It still makes me chuckle when I remember.

forgotmyusername1 · 28/04/2023 19:04

Not me but one of my colleagues who worked in the estate agency side of the business.

Client emailed in pulling out a property at the time of due exchange.

Colleague forwarded to someone else in the branch saying (look what this dick head just sent me)

10 mins later Colleague asked other colleague if he had got the email... the answer was no.

He has pressed reply rather than forward.

The branch manager had a fun phone call to make.

RosaBonheur · 28/04/2023 19:07

I had just started my first job in France and I needed to get hold of our CEO urgently to sign some documents. Being an iPhone girl at the time, I hadn't yet got to grips with my work Samsung. Anyway, I may have sent an email to the CEO from my phone in which the word "merci" somehow became "merde".

Hawkins003 · 28/04/2023 19:08

It's a mix at times,

emmathedilemma · 28/04/2023 19:12

Outlook once autocorrected wellies to willies for me!