I have a little rant today.
Its about unreturned messages.
Email. Telephone. Even snail mail (although I don’t use that as much anymore).
When someone doesn’t return your message, they’re basically ignoring you. Saying you don’t matter. Its kind of like turning your back on someone during a face to face conversation. At least in my opinion.
I do always try to give people the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they didn’t get my message I remind myself. Or, even I forget….shoot, I forget a lot. So, I leave 2 and 3 messages. Nice ones. But sometimes, people just don’t return messages.
Theres a woman I know socially who doesn’t return emails (like consistently). She’ll even send them out to a group and then when I respond, nothing. Irritates the hell out of me.
In another current situation (which is the one really causing this rant) I’m trying to credential (in other words, make her a member of their network of providers so she can bill for services provided to their eligible members) a mental health therapist I work for with the agency that administers the contract for mental health services in the state of New Mexico. I have to talk to this one paticular person and I’ve left her 3 messages at this point, actually 4 as I just left one. Not one returned call. No phone tag, no email (I left that too on my messages), nothing.
I can’t do my job until this woman gets in touch with me, and I have to waste my client’s money and time while I keep trying and trying to get this woman to talk to me.
There’s no reason for that.
None.
So, I called someone else today, and made sure that this woman’s name was mentioned. I’m playing a bit of phone tag with that person right now, but I’ll definitely be making sure it is clear that I’ve had to waste time on this issue – 3 weeks. And this process is never quick.
Meanwhile, the person I work for can’t start her business until this is all done!
Are you a person who doesn’t return messages? Tell me why? Help me understand. Please.
Or, do you hate unreturned messages as much as I do? Take a minute and commiserate with me!