Email communication

Tips on email communication

Staff should reply to your questions within 5 working days. This will normally be within office hours – Monday to Friday 9am-5pm. Weekends, bank holidays and periods when the University is closed do not constitute working days.
You are advised to check module handbooks or information on Blackboard before contacting staff to see if your query has already been answered. This will help you to get the information you need as quickly as possible.
If you receive an auto-reply message when you contact a member of staff and your query is urgent, you should contact the alternative person noted on the auto-reply message.
You should contact staff using your university email only – you can link your university email account to your personal account for your own convenience.
If you have a query about a module, please make sure you state the module you are asking about so staff can provide the correct support.
Please make sure you do not contact staff through social media direct messaging.

Microsoft Outlook

A quick guide to using Outlook to manage your university emails.

Email Etiquette

At university you will commonly use email to communicate with staff and fellow students, here are a few tips you help you:

It’s better to be too formal than too informal (consider that your email may be forwarded to another member of staff who you are not so familiar with)
Avoid using shorthand in emails, such as ‘thx’
Use correct grammar, complete sentences, and capital letters in the appropriate places (‘I’ not ‘i’)
Make sure your email address is appropriate and professional
Always check you’ve got the right name in the ‘To’ box, there are often staff members at university who have similar names
Make sure your email only goes to the people who need to read it. Remember that if you reply to all, then everyone will get your email
If you don’t want other recipients to see who else you’ve sent the email to, use the ‘bcc’ field
This sounds obvious, but don’t forget to attach attachments! A word of advice – attach the file you want to send before you start writing. That way, you can’t forget to attach it!
DON’T USE CAPITAL LETTERS! If you write in this way, you are basically shouting at your reader
Short emails can sometimes sound rude, so try to make them polite and friendly
Long emails can be quite off-putting, so consider putting extra information in an attachment, which the reader can read later
Proofread before you send. If you make mistakes in your email, people will think you also make mistakes in your work. So always check everything carefully
When contacting a member of staff via email, please make sure that you put the nature of your query in the ‘subject’ bar to indicate to staff what your email is about.

Email signature

When you first access your University email, it’s a good idea to add a signature that will automatically be included when you write and send emails. Your signature should include your full name, student ID, degree programme title and year of study. See the example below:

John Smith (12345678)
BA Criminology
Year 1

Urgent emails

On Outlook and Teams, you can mark emails and messages as ‘urgent’.

Please be mindful that this should only be used when absolutely necessary so that we can help students who need our attention under urgent circumstances.

Some examples of scenarios that could be considered urgent might include:

You are unable to submit a piece of work due to technical difficulties and you are about to hit the deadline – in this instance, an urgent email provides dated and timed evidence that you have completed the work on time (attach your work to the email).
You are experiencing a personal difficulty whereby you are concerned about your own wellbeing.
Unexpected family circumstances mean that you have to go home at short notice causing you to miss important learning/assessment activities which may impact your ability to complete work to deadlines.