Coworker ignores my emails, yet sends me emails...what should I do?

Question

There is an employee in another office of my business that I have to communicate with because they handle money and we handle the actual students. Sometimes she needs to know to which student to send money and sometimes I need to know if a specific student has money on their account. We need to send each other emails because of this. Here is how our communication has been so far:

April 1 - I sent her an email about a student
April 1 - She said she would find out and email me the next day
April 2 - At the end of the day I asked for an update
April 3 - My supervisor says someone from the other office *called* her, I emailed her and asked for written confirmation that the student was taken care of, to place in their file.
April 8 - I still haven't heard so I ask her to respond because I am still holding the file on my desk.
April 8 - She says someone else is handling it, she will let me know later in the day.
During this time we have two successful transactions.
April 17 - I ask again about the same student. I am still holding his file. She does not respond.
April 28 - I email her a question about a second student. She does not respond.
May 14 - I send her an email asking about the two students I have not heard from her about. I explain that the students are waiting on responses and I ask if I need to contact someone else about it.
May 14 - She forwards the email to her supervisor who calls me asking if I've emailed their office. I explain that I've sent multiple emails and tell her the dates. She says that the first student was taken care of on April 11, and that they will take care of the second. We also discuss a new policy where I should contact her in some cases (if a student wants money transferred) and her subordinate in all other cases. I ask for an email from here, with the two students' statuses, as well as our new agreement, so everything is in writing and clear. She says she'll email me that day, but doesn't
May 18 - I email the supervisor, asking for the two students' statuses and ask for confirmation our new policy agreement so that we have it in writing.
May 20 - I send the subordinate an email asking about a third student and get no response.
My supervisor called their office last week on Friday and asked for the information because I told her I would not keep sending emails only to have them ignored. The other supervisor spoke with mine and disclosed two of the students' statuses, but not the third. We still have not heard from them about the third.

Today I received an email from the subordinate asking about a student. I always answer her emails within 24 hours, but she has blatantly ignored mine. Now I'm having a moral dilemma as to whether I should answer this email promptly or wait a few days to give her a taste of her own medicine. I do not understand why she will ignore my emails yet expect me to respond to hers with no qualms?!

I have already told my supervisor and still have not gotten *email* updates to the two students that they responded about, and still haven't heard about one student. I need everything in writing, from the source to file in the students' files. I don't know what else to do...what would you do?

Answer 1

Well for one thing it won't help your case to ignore her emails because that crap always backfires. I would instead cc: your supervisor on further email inquiring to the students information and cc: her supervisor too. Then they will know the a$$hole she is. That should take care of the situation. What a biotch huh?

Answer 2

Your supervisor needs to get involved in this and decide how to handle it. You need your supervisor to be on your side and to advocate for you. Anything you do on your own could be misconstrued.



Your supervisor should probably take it to someone higher in the chain of command.

Answer 3

hard to do when it is your supervisor who does the ignoring! LOL!

Answer 4

Give deadlines in your mails. Ask the question, etc and then at the end say "I'll need a response by date X please". When they don't respond, write another email saying "I really need a response, I can afford a few more hours on this one, so please get back to me by the end of the day".



Discuss this with your manager for permission first, but when the person still doesn't respond, forward the email history in question to your manager, and cc both the employee and her manager as well.



There needs to be a regular record of a bad habit before a manager can discipline an employee.

Answer 5

Unfortunately, you still have to do your job, so provide whatever they request in a timely manner (as usual). That way your job won't be in jeopardy.



However, at the bottom of your response, include a table outlining your unanswered requests, including dates, AND I would copy both my supervisor and her supervisor.



They will see that you are covering your behind and building a case against them, then maybe they'll straighten up.



How aggravating.

Answer 6

Whew! It depends - if it means I will get in hot water with my supervisor, then I would continue making attempts (so you can cover your a**). If not, then I would wait until she asked me about the e-mail. Maybe if you ignore her like she does you, she may figure it out.

Answer 7

Personally I would confront her face to face about it. Tell her if she can not do her job properly by providing you with information then she shouldn't expect you to go out of your way to provide her with needed information. That is very immature. It's just showing how she will not work unless it benefits her. If she can not handle this confrontation then take it up with someone higher in the food chain.

Answer 8

start ignoring her like she does you and see how she likes it. if your job is on the line because of her,start communicating with someone else.