4 ms·

Companies should definitely have an easily-discovered means of contacting them if you have a concern about an email you received. But actually allowing replies

Companies should definitely have an easily-discovered means of contacting them if you have a concern about an email you received. But actually allowing replies to the email itself is just asking to get a lot of low-quality spammy replies that now you have to pay someone to wade through.

benjohnson 9y ago
And a crazy amount of "I'm on vacation" auto replies.
- ape4 9y ago
  We could have a mail field indicating if vacation replies are wanted. X-WantVacationReplies: no
  - kazinator 9y ago
    Or headers in the auto-reply mail which tag it as being auto-reply. These exist! https://stackoverflow.com/a/10839343/1250772 https://stackoverflow.com/a/10839343/1250772 This answer points at RFC containing recommendations for auto-reply e-mails, and specifies a header to use. Any new proposal will fall victim to the same opt-in problem to an even greater degree; if developers of auto-responders can't be bothered to follow this RFC, they will also ignore even newer recommendations.
  - bitJericho 9y ago
    or.. you know, a reply-to header where real emails can be sent to...
    - sp332 9y ago
      But if I'm on vacation, I don't want to read your email right now. I'm just letting you know that your email might not get a reply, especially not any time soon.
      - kybernetikos 9y ago
        Yeah, it seems like it's providing meta-information about the status of the email address owner rather than actually conveying information from the owner of the email address. Perhaps there should be a separate channel for such meta information.
mikehall314 9y ago
And bounces, and out of office autoresponders, and so on
- STRML 9y ago
  We do it anyway. It's easy enough to filter those types of emails. I think it's a huge plus for customer service to be able to say "Have a problem or question? Just reply..."
  - mikehall314 9y ago
    Sure. And I think that's a better approach, on balance.
  - nsxwolf 9y ago
    How do you know if you've been filtered? Not getting a response would lead to a lot of frustration.
    - STRML 9y ago
      We only set really obvious filters, as to filter too little than too much. But of course, it's not perfect every time.
  - bitJericho 9y ago
    Having worked in email queues, filters are nowhere near good enough. Nothing is more infuriating than wasting hours on bounces.
eloisant 9y ago
If you have a good quality customer support/CRM tool it should take care of the most obvious, connect to the corresponding customer, and be easy to manage.
zeveb 9y ago
> But actually allowing replies to the email itself is just asking to get a lot of low-quality spammy replies that now you have to pay someone to wade through. If I give them my personal email address (risking low-quality spammy email) then they should at least give me a real corporate address when they send me an email, accepting the risk of a low-quality spammy reply. That's power symmetry.

benjohnson 9y ago

And a crazy amount of "I'm on vacation" auto replies.

ape4 9y ago
We could have a mail field indicating if vacation replies are wanted. X-WantVacationReplies: no
- kazinator 9y ago
  Or headers in the auto-reply mail which tag it as being auto-reply. These exist! https://stackoverflow.com/a/10839343/1250772 https://stackoverflow.com/a/10839343/1250772 This answer points at RFC containing recommendations for auto-reply e-mails, and specifies a header to use. Any new proposal will fall victim to the same opt-in problem to an even greater degree; if developers of auto-responders can't be bothered to follow this RFC, they will also ignore even newer recommendations.
- bitJericho 9y ago
  or.. you know, a reply-to header where real emails can be sent to...
  - sp332 9y ago
    But if I'm on vacation, I don't want to read your email right now. I'm just letting you know that your email might not get a reply, especially not any time soon.
    - kybernetikos 9y ago
      Yeah, it seems like it's providing meta-information about the status of the email address owner rather than actually conveying information from the owner of the email address. Perhaps there should be a separate channel for such meta information.

mikehall314 9y ago

And bounces, and out of office autoresponders, and so on

STRML 9y ago
We do it anyway. It's easy enough to filter those types of emails. I think it's a huge plus for customer service to be able to say "Have a problem or question? Just reply..."
- mikehall314 9y ago
  Sure. And I think that's a better approach, on balance.
- nsxwolf 9y ago
  How do you know if you've been filtered? Not getting a response would lead to a lot of frustration.
  - STRML 9y ago
    We only set really obvious filters, as to filter too little than too much. But of course, it's not perfect every time.
- bitJericho 9y ago
  Having worked in email queues, filters are nowhere near good enough. Nothing is more infuriating than wasting hours on bounces.

eloisant 9y ago

If you have a good quality customer support/CRM tool it should take care of the most obvious, connect to the corresponding customer, and be easy to manage.

zeveb 9y ago

> But actually allowing replies to the email itself is just asking to get a lot of low-quality spammy replies that now you have to pay someone to wade through. If I give them my personal email address (risking low-quality spammy email) then they should at least give me a real corporate address when they send me an email, accepting the risk of a low-quality spammy reply. That's power symmetry.