Forum Discussion
Julia Foran
Microsoft
MicrosoftAccept & 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
307 Replies
- The 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.- FYI, 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.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
Julia Foran I love this idea and the proposed solution. I think this is what many people intend the functionality to work. They want to see the tracking, but just not get the emails associated with it.
So, after som testing we see that this "feature" only exits on the windows desktop outlook client. All other clients works as expected. On the outlook client for MacOS you can choose to accept without sending a response, and it shows that you have acceptet in tracker. Same for the iPhone Outlook app and also when you are using outlook web app, it shows to have acceptet even if you don´t sent a response.
Agree! I have always assumed that the response is RECORDED just NOT SENT. This seems intuitive to me. I am in agreement with the changes you are looking to make. We urge all employees to use their microsoft calendaring features. Often times, meetings are canceled and rescheduled if required participants do not respond. It's actually a bit disturbing to think this is likely the reason why we see so many "none" in the tracking.
If the meeting is accepted, it should always read "accepted" in the tracking.
Such an intuitive and helpful change, yet 4 years have now gone by. I am losing hope that MS will ever do anything about this. I have had to educate the people I work with to "send a response" when the invitee list is not too lengthy HeatherDCS
Yes, it seems to have gone off the radar for good sadly. Only yesterday I worked with another group who had no idea about this. Shared this with them of course - https://www.lingfordconsulting.com.au/ms-outlook/accepting-outlook-meeting-correctly
- Would love to know if this is still in the development roadmap. Thinking of ways to reduce email traffic both from a productivity perspective and also a carbon perspective. I wonder how many emails can be prevented per year per user through a feature like this? Seems like a quick win to me.
satnam99 Hello Satnam99, No. it is a dead end. It was probably always a dead end, with MS support just paying us lip service. I believe they changed it on the web platform but not on the oh-so much more widely used desktop app. That suggests it was too difficult a fix for them. I thought it might be amended in Windows 11 or whatever they put out next but I forget how many years ago I requested this change and If anyone else is reading this... we'll just have to check out the next version and hope they have seen sense.
- Yep agreed and they don't even give you lip service, they just ignore the issue and hope people will stop complaining about it BUT it is affecting everyone using the desktop app. I feel like it is in the too hard basket as it's a design flaw and they don't know how to fix it.
- Yes please to both. Would save meeting organizers time chasing down attendees without responses and not clutter mailboxes.
- Based on the responses both of these are an excellent idea. Since this was started in 2018, when will this be implemented?
- Ah, Gary. You're late to the party. We have basically packed up and gone home. It became obvious after a year of inaction on the desktop version this wasnt gonna happen. I thought it might be fixed in the next windows upgrade but there has been no word on that either. There are rumours Julia left long ago. We will just have to see what's occurrin' when the next Windows does come out.
Lucien Riviere So it looks like Julia Foran has definitnely left Microsoft but no one has taken up the blog to provide updates. I tried to PM Julia Foran and the message could not be sent.
I had previously PM'd her with no issues but it's been months since I tried that.
- YES, please. Make that change.
Agree w/Pablo R. Ortiz. As a sender, I don't want to clog my Inbox w/responses. However, I would EXPECT people to Accept/Tentative/Decline to have the meeting blocked in their calendar. As the sender/meeting organizer, I expect to TRACK the responses. Additionally, I CLEAR the Response Request default option in conjuction w/an auto-reply in my mailbox. By Microsoft making that change (organizer does not request response BUT want to TRACK who responded w/Accept/Tentative/Decline/None is important). Thank you!!!It's in the too hard basket unfortunately as Microsoft clearly DO NOT care at all for their customers. We have a 365 business account and it does not make a difference!
Julia Foran either does not work there anymore or has also given up on attempting to rectify this massive oversight and design flaw.
PS to even tag someone in a reply you have to open the "full text editor" and if you do that you lose all your typed text.
- Yes and Yes. This is a problem for me today because I have a large meeting to run and no idea of who is actually coming to it because our folk tick "don't send a response".
I manage the irritating amount of email for responders by having a mail rule set up to catch responses (regularly cleaned out) but manage my meetings and potential attendees by using the Tracking feature.- Hi @DMerton... hopefully this gets resolved soon...in the meantime, if you are interested, I wrote a little article on this a while ago which has been used by some people to educate others in their organisation. For what it is worth... https://www.lingfordconsulting.com.au/ms-outlook/accepting-outlook-meeting-correctly Thanks.
Julia Foran So it turns out this was first raised on the "Feedback by UserVoice" over 5 years ago here
Accept - Do Not Send a Response and it still hasn't been implemented? Does anyone actually work at Microsoft or do they just charge clients a small fortune for sub standard services?I can not believe it - 3 months on and still no update from Julia Foran ?? Not sure if she even works at Microsoft anymore?!?!
To add fuel to the fuel they DELETED the blog from 5 years ago that I posted above on May 19 which was on the "Feedback by UserVoice" page.
- Hi Stephen.
Well, it's a lost cause. When Windows 11 or whatever they wanna call it comes out, if it hasn't changed then we know they don't take it seriously despite the e-traffic that has passed and, if it is changed, its likely they were always gonna make the change for the new Windows and just not bother to tell us cos they knew it would be, what is it now , 3yrs?? down the line. L
