January 13, 2020
These days are all about communication and contact with the other. It is very important that it is as fast as possible, considering our busy lives in a work environment, studying, or simply living day by day.
For these reasons it is very common to forget to answer an email, or maybe put it off until the next day, and that’s how we neglect to answer the emails.
So how can you explain that without giving the appearance of being impolite or that you simply didn’t consider their message important? Surely you wouldn’t want them to think this, but in fact with “email etiquette” it is considered impolite to leave someone waiting for an answer for days or even weeks, even when it was just a mistake. So taking all this into account, we could say that we owe the person or company an apology.
Sometimes we do not have the right words for what we want to express especially when we consider this to be a simple transgression. We do not have the creativity to merge the words to create the perfect and correct phrases to say what we feel, especially when words are not really “our thing”.
However, you must put yourself on the other side and try to have a bit of empathy, and feel like the other, so take all this into account. It really is much better for this person to receive a sincere and elaborated response in which you include an “apology” and maybe a “It will not happen again”, in a professional way with well chosen academic words.
So here we present to you the best ways to say “I’m sorry“, without just saying “I’m sorry.”
10 Ways to say sorry for the late reply in an email.
Here are 10 Fill-in-the-Blank response’s you can copy and paste it your emails
1. I would like to express my sincere apologies for the delay in replying to your email from the last date: ———. I am very sorry for the mistake, and I hope it has had no consequences, nor serious repercussions for our business relationship.
2. My sincere apologies for such a slow reply, I hope it has not caused delay or reduced efficiency in the performance of your company, and work of your staff. We ——— are glad to have the opportunity to contact with you again, and thank you for your patience. Regards!
3. We are very grateful for your email sent the last: ——, we are pleased to answer you. We would also like to apologise for the delay, hoping that this did not mean the delay caused any inconvenience. Thank you for your attention and regards.
4. Thank you so much for reaching out us a few days ago, more specifically on date:——-. We want to let you know how glad we are to contact you, and at the same time remind you how important your Email is for us, we hope you will forgive us the delay. If you are still available then please let us know with a responsive message, thank you.
5. Thank you for your patience. We are pleased to respond to your Email from the day:—-, and we apologise for the delay. Thank you also for highlighting how important it’s for us, the company;—–, to respond promptly to your message.
6. We are very sorry for the delay in responding to your message. On every occasion we do our best to answer as quickly as possible, and in the most efficient way. However, on this occasion we have fallen short. Thank you very much for your understanding.
7. We would like to express our most sincere apology, regarding the delay presented for you to receive a response from us. On behalf of all those involved we remind you how important your message is to us and we are sorry for any kind of delay that may have generated inconveniences for you and your company
8. We thank you for our wait and consideration We hope that the current delay presented regarding the response of this Email has not had any negative impact on the efficiency and performance of your work. Thank you very much and greetings.
9. As one of many people who have decided to contact us, we thank you for your email and hope that the delay in answering has not been an obstacle or annoyance in any way.
10. We appreciate your contact with our company:——-, we are very happy to answer your message, and thank you very much for contacting us the day:——. However, we apologise for the delay for a response from us. We ask for your patience and understanding. Regards!
Do remember that an answer, however brief it is, shows more courtesy and professionalism than silence. If you have too many things to do, say it frankly: “I can’t handle this at the moment due to our workload but will give it every attention very soon”, or simply respond as soon as you can do it. Never would it be an option to ignore the Email. People would think that you don’t give them importance, or maybe you could be taken as impolite or even a little rude.
Asking for an apology may help to make it easier and deflect some of the annoyance previously caused from the delay. However, once you have apologised, it would be better to avoid that situation happening again, because people may take it as disrespectful and maybe they could think that they are not being taken seriously if it happens a second or even a third time.
It is much better to avoid that kind of situation, and for the next occasion take due importance to answer all emails received, either from the same person, or from some other in that company. In short, even a “holding email” to them just acknowledging their correspondence and saying you will reply soon is better than no communication at all .
