139
kweakzs
6y

Got an email from client with subject starting with "VERY URGENT", the email mentioned how urgent it is to fix this issue multiple times, it implied that they couldn't do anything else while this issue existed, but they were very light on details. So sparse on them that I couldn't reproduce the issue. 15 minutes after the original email I write a reply asking for some clarifications.

They proceed not to reply for 4 days. Fix took 5 minutes after they explained the problem better.

Apparently it wasn't so urgent after all.

Comments
  • 26
    Classic.
    Welcome to devrant!
  • 21
    Urgency is relative.
    It’s always urgent at the time, but never urgent later
  • 13
    That's why I never rush to answer if something 'urgent' comes in. Usually it can be fixed one hour later very easily once everybody has calmed down.
  • 17
    My response is always "Urgent for whom?"

    If something is urgent, either a dev made a nasty mistake or someone else cannot schedule. The former makes it urgent for me, the latter does not.
  • 9
    Use the Michael Scott approach:
    "I mark memos Urgent A, Urgent B, Urgent C, Urgent D. Urgent A is the most important. Urgent D you don’t even really have to worry about."
  • 7
    Behind the scenes, they probably exchanged 50 emails and rescheduled 2 meetings, in order to determine what exactly is wrong.
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