Do's

• Read you e-mail regularly. Ignoring a message is discourteous and confusing to the sender.
• Always reply, even if a brief acknowledgement is all you can manage. This will avoid doubt in the mind of the reader that you have received the message.
• Reply promptly and put your reply at the top of the message.
• Be tolerant of others' mistakes. Some people may not be good typists, or they may accidentally delete your message and ask you to resend it.
• Attribute quotes from any source other than yourself, just as you would in any published work.
• Keep your signature brief (four to five lines maximum) and informative (include a telephone number).
• Use humor, sarcasm and irony sparingly; they may not be understood by all readers because e-mail lacks communication clues such as facial expression and body language.
 

Don'ts

• Don't make changes to someone else's e-mail and pass it on without making it clear that you have made changes.
• Don't send an e-mail when you are angry or upset.
• Don't say anything about a third party that you would not say directly to that person. Defamation by e-mail carries the same consequences as by any other medium.
• Don't assume that your e-mail has been read.
• Don't label every message as a high priority.
• Don't send or forward chain letters.
 

Reprinted with permission from Queensland University of Technology.