Email Guidelines

UNE considers email as an important means of communication and recognises the importance of proper email content and speedy replies in conveying a professional image and delivering good service. Therefore UNE wishes users to adhere to the following guidelines:

General:

• Write short, well-structured emails and use short, descriptive subjects. Use 'plain text' format emails and do not send HTML or rich text emails unless absolutely necessary. Do not send HTML emails to mailing lists.
• Do not use cc: or bcc: fields unless the cc: or bcc: recipient is aware of the reason that you will be copying an email to him/her and knows what action, if any, to take. Superfluous emails ("friendly fire") are time-wasters and should be avoided.
• If you forward emails, state clearly what action you expect the recipient to take. Seek permission from the original sender if necessary.
• Only mark emails as important if they really are important.
• Include a brief signature that includes your name, your title and your contact details. Consider setting up an automatic reply message (vacation message) while you are on leave.

Attachments:

• Do not send unnecessary attachments. Include text in the body of the email instead of in a separate attachment. Never send attachments to an email list, instead make the attachment available via a web page and send the URL or ask people to email you requesting the attachment if they are interested.
• Use standard formats in your attachments - .pdf or .rtf for text files and .jpg for images are generally considered the most accessible and cross-platform formats.
• Check the size of your attachments before sending your email. While the download of large attachments may be fast on UNE's network, it can take a long time on modem dial-ups. 5 minutes download time per 1 MB of file is a realistic estimate for modem users. Use a compression utility like WinZip or StuffIt to reduce the size of large attachments or consider alternative distribution mechanisms (webpage, CD-Rom, hardcopy) instead.

Maintenance:

• Be aware that space on our mailserver is limited. Only keep copies of your emails on the server for a limited time.
• Delete any email messages that you do not need to have a copy of, and empty your trash regularly.
• Backup official correspondence and attachments. Refer to UNE RMO procedures for Corporate Records.