to ask what's the best accidental email you've seen?

[travellerist]

Literally an hour ago an email went round to all staff/managers at my work requesting if anyone needed webcams/headphones for remote meetings.

One of my colleagues is friendly with the email sender and I guess he meant to hit reply with his response but instead hit reply all, and his response was...

"That’s the best laugh I’ve had in months…

Web Cams, seriously… have you any idea how ugly half of these people are ? Not seeing them is the best part of working from home… Face Masks are the best thing since sliced bread 😊

Headset, Nah… I’d probably stand up and drag the PC into the kitchen. Don’t suppose you can get ink cartridges though ?"

I'm guessing he's going to hear from HR pretty soon, but it got me wondering if anyone else has some "whoops" email stories?

My elderly dad sent a text to Vodaphone (instead of to me), telling them that he'd found his false teeth under the bedcovers.

SIL, a managing director, recently received flowers from a business associate to thank her for some work. The company that delivered the flowers emailed a photo of them on her doorstep to prove they'd been delivered. Unfortunately, SIL had already opened the door so this guy received a photo of her up to her thighs that made it look like she was naked except for a single sock.

She was fully clothed but her shorts were cut out of the pic by a weird soft-focus frame.

Someone else's post reminded me of another one.
I got an email inviting me to a do in London (we're Midlands) to celebrate the end of a tricky research project (my job is the finance part and I would be submitting the final expenditure statement to get the payment). I was umming and ahhing about going, didn't have a child back then so no commitments. Checked with my manager.
Get another email about an hour later. I was never supposed to have been invited, just for those who worked on the project.
A real slap in the face as they wouldn't get the money without me

[quote MulticolourMophead]**@chrislilleyswig don't think it was linked, just referred to.[/quote]
Yes, I Googled it because I didn't know what it was. Seemed a rather simple solution to me

Not an email one but just last week we had a virtual company meeting, all 150 people dialled in. Unfortunately the IT guy forgot he had his camera on and was caught on camera snogging his girlfriend while the MD was presenting. I'm sure that was an uncomfortable chat with HR!

There is of course John Lewis on Twitter who gets tweeted frequently instead of the shop

My secretary sent through her resignation by email but forgot to delete the thread of emails below in which she and another member of staff were slagging me and other staff off!

About 30 years ago we had an IT guy in showing us all the internet and email. We were practising by emailing our colleagues across the office and back. One guy emailed all staff in error but in his email he was jokingly giving out about the MD and talking about what a wanker he was, how does anyone work for that cock and more I can't remember. We were in the Dublin office and the MD was in the head office in London which had about 500 staff.

My friend became a legend. He had to go to a meeting in London about 6 months later - he was bricking it. He had strangers coming up shaking his hand. Even the MD wanted to meet him..

My team lead sent me the details of some queries a customer had sent him. I addressed each question and answered them accordingly, typing the response under the question and highlighting it in a different colour so he could see my responses.

Some of the questions were pretty daft, things the customer had been told many times before so at the end I put something like “finally, tell x to stop asking stupid questions” with a smiley face.

I sent back to my team lead.

Team lead forwarded my reply without reading it!!

Customer replied and copied me in, thanked me for the answers and promised to stop asking stupid questions 😳. Good job he saw the funny side!!

I was organising a weekend away with 3 friends and emailed the the details along with a bit of a plan of what were doing and where.

I received an email back from a solicitor I had been dealing with who said that it sounds like a lovely weekend but I presume it's not me that you are inviting. She had the same first name as one of my friends. Aaaagh

My STBXH's lawyer sent an email that was supposed to go to him to me by accident.
He was a cocklodger who was trying his luck to get money out of me.
The email was basically (but written in legal speak) to tell him that he didn't have a leg to stand on, but it would cost me so much to go to court to get rid of him that he may as well ask me for a bit less than what that would cost, in the hope that i would just pay him to go away.
It was followed by a panicky email asking me to delete it and insinuating that I would have been in the wrong to read it 🙄
Needless to say, it increased my confidence in telling him to fuck off and he wasn't getting a penny out of me.

@Worstemailever

Several years ago, my in-laws (who can talk the hind legs off a donkey) sent me an email telling me that an elderly relative of theirs was dying, so they were racing to hospital to be at her side. Then, half an hour later they emailed to say that she had passed away as they pulled into the carpark. I forwarded it onto my friend and said, "a wise move on her part. Can you imagine being 94 and lying on your deathbed, when that pair show up". Of course I didn't forward it to my friend. I had accidentally forwarded it back to them. Oh god. I still cringe to this day. It was utterly horrendous and sooo stressful. Oh, the fall out! They didn't speak to me for weeks and when they finally did, I received the most toe curling long response reprimanding me. I've never felt so small. I still want the ground to swallow me up when I think about it!

"a wise move on her part. Can you imagine being 94 and lying on your deathbed, when that pair show up"

That is hilarious, I actually had a sharp intake of breath when I read that you forwarded it to them (equivalent of "I spat tea on my keyboard" for me)

I bet you had that awful cold/hot going down a long dark tunnel feeling when you realised I have a few times

@TheBitchOfTheVicar

I was once shown an email which was a response to an email from a larger organisation. As GDPR was being implemented, the organisation had emailed to ask if all receipents were happy for their contact details to be shared with each other...only they had forgotten to BCC. Response asked for it to be logged as a breach, obvs

One of my suppliers sent me an email detailing their recent award of a specific data security award. And forgot to BCC it to their clients.

I once accidentally sent a password to our head of information security. That took a long time to sort out.

@Harls1969

I also appear to have a similar email address to several other people. I've received invitations to family parties, in America and they were very confused when I replied saying that I wasn't their daughter in law! Invitations make up a basketball team, again in the states. I live in the UK, it's a bit of a trek! Yesterday I received one from a teacher regarding holiday club dates and attaching a (confidential) report about the child! Always getting receipts for various purchases, bookings etc

I must have a similar email address to a nurse in Australia, I received her new contract from the hospital HR dept. I also receive her notifications from an Aussie swingers site

And someone in the US, I was invited to help set up for a wedding in the middle of nowhere (didn’t sound fun to be honest) and keep getting her job application receipts for a buffalo wings joint.

Also someone in the UK, have had their flight confirmations and theatre tickets!

Colleague sent an email ending with “Sorry for any incontinence caused” on an email about a bowel screening project. She didn’t realise until someone replied saying oh you do make me laugh and asked me to read over the email to figure out what was so funny. I couldn’t tell her for laughing

I’ve also had a couple of reply instead of forwarding fails when I’ve been moaning about people, worst feeling in the world when you realise

@HowzAboutThisThen

I still remember the feeling well. An icy feeling that spread through my entire body, followed by my stomach dropping and heart racing. To make matters worse, having totally ignored me and my apologies for 6 weeks (including sil), I received such a carefully crafted essay that it was clear that they had sought advice from friends/got someone else to write it. It wasn't in their style at all! God knows how many people they consulted with over the response!

I once received an email inviting me to a conference of some sort in France. I was a primary TA at the time so it definitely wasn't meant for me! I wrote back and explained, and the sender apologised for the mistake and told me that it was a lovely part of France and I should visit it someday if I could!

Less pleasantly, I was once in an online hobby group which included 3 people who I'll call Kate A, Kate B, and Jane. Jane wrote a frank email about her (legitimate) grievances with Kate A, which she meant to send to me and Kate B, asking for advice on whether she was being unreasonable, and if not, whether she should tactfully raise the matter with Kate A and/or the group admins.

Of course she sent the email to me and Kate A by mistake.

I forgot to mention the time a colleague was working from home on a very hot day. He phoned his team leader, but accidentally video dialled. He was sat in his boxers at the time 😀.

[quote Worstemailever]@HowzAboutThisThen

I still remember the feeling well. An icy feeling that spread through my entire body, followed by my stomach dropping and heart racing. To make matters worse, having totally ignored me and my apologies for 6 weeks (including sil), I received such a carefully crafted essay that it was clear that they had sought advice from friends/got someone else to write it. It wasn't in their style at all! God knows how many people they consulted with over the response![/quote]
What did you partner say about it all? And do they speak to you normally now?!

Was going through a difficult legal case and custody battle with ex who very abusive and lying in court statements about me.

I sent him an email about the children asking politely why he had not turned up for visitation that day. (Plonker wanted full custody so as not to pay child support but couldn’t be bothered to exercise his visitation rights).

He replied to me but instead of replying to my original email - replied from one where he has contacted a prostitute online to arrange a “meet up” for the day he should have visited the kids.

I sat on it for 2 days and then wrote back asking that in the future to not to be copied in when fixing appointments relating to his sex life.

We were due in court the following week and he had to show his commitment to visitation.
My lawyer submitted our supporting documentation to court and his lawyer including the infamous email showing he missed visitation to meet a prostitute.

3 days later he turned up on my doorstep and said he was dropping his case and would agree to sign an agreement giving me full custody. I think his lawyer told him to forget it. Would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation.

I know I would have won as I was living in a. Country at the time which nearly always gave the mother full custody And he was useless as a father. But it saved me a ton of money in legal fees and a wonderful peace of mind. And a sense of karma.

A colleague in my team rang in sick. She had a meeting scheduled with another department so I emailed said department to let them know.

'Jane is off dick today'

I had an altercation with my daughters head of year and received an email declaring his dislike for me , my daughter and my apparant lack of parental care where school activities were concerned ( all personal views by the HoD not based on anything other than his own dislike ) ... he blamed his PA for pressing send all .. I had a field day writing my response ! Thank god my daughter left soon after !

My young son had been poorly on and off so had a few hospital admissions and tests done, I receive all correspondence via a patient portal emailed to my phone. One day they sent the lastest results says he had a ‘elivated white cell count’ only they missed the o out of count. He was only 7 and the school wanted copies of the letters as he had missed school etc. I phoned up and explained what they had written, queue Being contacted by every senior manager in the department asking if I wanted to make a official complaint- no I just wanted a letter that I could show to school and had no intention of an official complaint it was clearly a typo, it did make me laugh though

@HowzAboutThisThen

I had to immediately come clean to my husband as he works in IT and I needed him to help me recall the email. He couldn't of course. It was too late. He was a bit annoyed, but took the attitude that it served me right. There was a bit of a back story to the whole thing. I'd been under a huge amount of stress and have an inappropriate sense of humour, so my statement was mischievous rather than malicious. Thankfully they eventually accepted my apology and we all get on fine now. However, I am yet to face Sil in person and she can be a tricky customer. She's never liked me so will no doubt hold it against me still.

@MrsMontgomerySmythe

Well, that's Karma for you!! Brilliant result!