Forum Discussion
Julia Foran
Microsoft
Feb 03, 2018Accept & Do Not Send a Response
Hi Calendar Community,
We'd like your feedback & reactions to a change we're considering:
Current experience:
When attendees receive a meeting invite, they are provided with 3 response options:
The first two options (Edit the response before sending & Send the response now) both send an email to the organizer, and the attendee's response is recorded in the organizer's tracking list.
The third option (Do not send a response) does not notify organizer, so the attendee's response remains as "None" in the organizer's tracking list.
What we'd like to change:
Many users report that they expect Do not send a response to be recorded in the organizer's tracking list, but just not to send an email. We are considering updating the behavior so that all 3 response options are recorded in the organizer's tracking list. Attendees can still use the Do not send a response option to avoid sending email to the organizer, but their response would now be recorded & shared with organizer.
Questions to the Community:
- Do you like this change? Does this match what you & others are expecting?
- What about when an organizer does not request responses (so there is just a simple Accept button without additional options)? Do you think the intention is to avoid email responses? In other words, would you expect this same behavior (responses are always recorded) to apply even when organizer does not request responses?
What's the status of this change to allow for tracking the response if the user selects "Accept Do Not Send a response"?
Thank you - Jack
- javiles555Copper Contributor
Julia ForanAny updates on this idea of being able to track RSVP replies in the organizer's tracking list even though the invitee has selected Do not send a response? This is a much-requested behavior as organizer's distinguish between tracking attendance and receiving responses as two unique needs that should be managed separately.
- GuntherMCopper Contributor
Hallo liebes Microsoft Team,
wie ich verstanden habe, ist es seitens Microsoft nicht vorgesehen, dass die Option „Keine Antwort senden“ aus den drei Antwortmöglichkeiten Annehmen/Ablehnen/Unter Vorbehalt generell durch Microsoft gelöscht wird.
Für Nutzer, die in einem großen Konzern arbeiten, habe ich daher die folgende Frage:
Inwiefern ist es Admins (also zB eine IT-Abteilung, die die Produkte Microsoft im Konzern zur Verfügung stellen) möglich diese Option auszugrauen oder auszublenden, also firmenspezifisch anzupassen?
Das Ausgrauen ist doch eine verfügbare Funktion, wenn zB Netzwerkeinstellungen in einem Großkonzern nicht individueller ohne Adminrechte angepasst werden sollen, dann werden diese ja auch ausgegraut und mit einem ähnlichen Hinweis versehen wie „Diese Einstellungen sind durch Ihr Unternehmen vorgegeben“.
Wenn es nicht geht, ist es denkbar, dies zumindest für Entwerpriseeditionen verfügbar zu machen, damit das durch die Kunden von Microsoft „angepasst“ werden kann?
Mit der Bitte um kurze Rückantwort.
Grüße! - Stefan TucnyCopper Contributor
It appears Microsoft Finally Resolved this issue this year.
According to the Microsoft Support page Shared Calendar Updates in Outlook for Windows under 'Long awaited improvements':
Accept a meeting without having to send a response
If you select Accept > Do Not Send a Response, others can still see your response in the Tracking tab. Previously, the organizer would not see your response if you did not explicitly send a response email. This improvement also applies if you chose not to send a response if you Tentatively Accept or if you Decline.
- Stephen_33Brass ContributorWhat is actually happening, this still hasn’t been fixed for the huge majority of invites that are sent out daily. When is Microsoft going to fix this, after all it’s only been open for 6 years???
- Stephen_fortCopper Contributor
Stefan Tucny I disagree that is not resolved, that is a small part of the fix. The majority send invites from an individual email account so this is just the first step to resolving this issue that has been open for years now!!!!
- TobyBerlaCopper ContributorI think that deciding whether a problem is "resolved" or "not resolved" depends on one's perspective. For the great majority of the users (including me), some of whom who started reporting this problem to Microsoft nearly 10 years ago, the problem is clearly not resolved. I still regularly point out to my colleagues that when they accept my meeting invitation and specify "Do not send a response", I have no way of knowing whether they even opened the invitation.
This "first step" *is* a positive one. But it doesn't yet fix the problem.
- Brandon LittleBrass Contributor
Stefan Tucny so this is for shared calendars and not for individuals who set meetings?
I tested this by setting a meeting in my calendar and invited a person. They chose accept and do not send a response and decline and do not send a response (after rescheduling the meeting). Both times the response showed none in the tracking tab.
- TobyBerlaCopper Contributor
Brandon Little - I concur. I recently invited a person to a meeting, which he accepted with "do not send a response". Same as before: his acceptance did not appear on the Tracking tab for the meeting. So... was this fix only for *shared* calendars?
- ShaunJenningsBrass ContributorI think that if Microsoft makes a change to remove the option of "Do not send a response". The way I understand how invites work, even in real life, if you do not respond, the requestor has no clue that you are planning on attending. I think that was the intended way Microsoft wanted this to function.
Wouldn't changing the Do Not Send a Response to automatically sending a response, wouldn't that just be Send the Response Now?
Microsoft, please just get rid of the Do Not Send a Response option.- Grant TaylorBrass ContributorI want to be added to the Attending list WITHOUT the organizer getting an email in their inbox. As someone else here posted, what you want is possible at a tenant level
- GeoffLCSIron Contributor
Grant Taylor yes, and as someone who sees this all the time, that is exactly what people expect to happen....but sadly, that's not what happens as we all know. I just keep trying to educate everyone that I work with, which is certainly not a fix, but necessary for now - https://www.lingfordconsulting.com.au/ms-outlook/accepting-outlook-meeting-correctly
- Stephen_33Brass ContributorYes but literally everyone expected the meeting to be updated that they are coming or not and the organiser does not get an email. So they need to keep it but update the logic, which is taking years to do so who knows when it’s actually going to happen.
- Grant TaylorBrass ContributorYes and yes. Any other behaviour seems silly. Why would I accept but not want the organizer to know I was attending? That use case seems rare, at best.
- Stephen_33Brass ContributorAgreed it’s a bad design and should have been fixed years ago. I actually don’t think they care and are hoping people will just accept it. Poor form Microsoft.
- Stephen_33Brass ContributorMore than 5 years on and it is still not fixed??? Can someone please give us an update!!!!!
- dpettitt1Copper ContributorI just ran into this problem today. I've been using Outlook for over 25 years and I just now realized that the organizer doesn't see my response in their meeting tracker if i Accept but don't send a response. I would love for this to be fixed.
- Stephen_33Brass ContributorYep I hear you. I only found out as we were wondering why hardly anyone accepted or declined the meeting. It’s annoying that they have fixed it on other platforms except the most used one. I don’t think they even care as it’s been raised in multiple places over the years and they still haven’t fixed or at least told us when it’s going to be fixed.
- jeffbloomerCopper Contributor1. Yes.
2. There may be times when we also are updating from Accept, to Decline, or Vice Versa and don't want to be sending multiple emails, but still would like for the status to still reflect in the organizer's log. It reduces all of the emails going back and forth, yet keeps everything up to date. - ux0042Copper Contributor
Also, Outlook tracking only lists some recipients who have not responded as "None" (at least when sending to a distribution list). Can anyone explain Outlook's rules for which recipient will be shown in tracking as "None" when no response has been received? Could it be that only the recipients who opened the meeting invitation on their phone or the web but took no action therefore some data is sent back to the organizer's Outlook client so the tracking will list only that recipient as "None"?
- Grant TaylorBrass ContributorI would love this, but apparently it has been abandoned, according to this thread. I hate that this techcommunity has replaced UserVoice. Now we just yell into the void.
- askunCopper ContributorThe expectation is that this option does not "send" an email response. If it's supposed to hide the response for some reason (to which I see no point at all), it should've said do not "show" the response. This option should be removed until it is fixed as it's causing huge problems with event planning.
So yes, do not send a response should prevent triggering an email but absolutely display the response in the tracking list.- swadegeigerCopper ContributorFYI, as others have pointed out, certain client applications are starting to "work as expected" in that the option to Do Not Send a Response is not sending an email, but is updating the Tracking status. erikj_UA is reporting success on iOS, Android, and with the Outlook Web app.
I'm also seeing this "working" in the "New Outlook" desktop app (which is just the web app packaged for Windows desktop - though there are currently loads of other issues there). In fact, it looks like Microsoft have changed the response options, to Yes, I'll attend, I might attend, and No, I won't attend, each with an checkbox option for "Email organizer" (vs. the more confusing "Response" verbiage. Unfortunately, it seems like Teams doesn't have an option for sending a response / email, and always seems to email the organizer.
In summary, it seems like progress is being made across a large issue, spanning multiple applications, and the terminology is being made more clear in how each of the options will behave.- Lucien RiviereBrass Contributor
swadegeiger well, hello. this is all very odd. I tracked back to the first entry in this conversation, and I have NEVER seen Julia Foran's 'initial' request for feedback on this. I think I posted a query back in 2016 and about twice a year someone pops up with a response and is just discovering that the Meeting Invite Response system (as it was) didnt/doesnt really work. And I know, I, and other regular contributors over the years, never heard from Julia ever again. I only hope nothing untoward happened to her!
swadegeiger I am yet to experience of what you write but it sounds positive. Of course, it should always have been a fix in 10 or 11 anyway but I am still on 10. Thank you, and everyone, for looking out for this. Let's put it to bed. Either MS will see sense and fix it properly in the way that the people who actually use the software will benefit or, well, we've managed to get this far, now we know!
Be well, take care. Lx