In Microsoft Outlook, you can insert reminder email messages to help keep you organized. Outlook provides several reminder feature options, including reminders, meeting reminders, and task reminders.
To insert a reminder email, start Microsoft Outlook and create a new message. Locate the Reminder tab and click the Reminder button. You can also insert a reminder by navigating to the File tab >> Options >> Reminders.
Configure Follow-up reminder in Outlook Email is slightly different from what you learn to set a reminder for the outlook calendar.
What is a Reminder in Outlook Email?
Getting tons of emails in your inbox can be arranged or highlighted according to your priority, you can arrange the emails smartly, but still, most users face a problem to respond an important email or event, due to your busy schedule.
For instance:
- You received an email for the last date of your credit card bill payment.
- Insurance expiry email, which needs to be renewed today itself.
- Doctor appointment, which can’t be missed.
- Most of the other examples
The point is you can either read or unread those email messages, but in both cases, keep in mind to get your work done is important.
You can color those important emails using conditional formatting, but if you are in the middle of important work, and you can’t execute the action for that important email, you can get it done when you are free.
But again, did you remember, or did Outlook reminds you of that.
This article is all about “How to Add Reminder in Outlook Email?”
How to Set reminders for your existing email in your Inbox?
I always usually prioritize my inbox to reply to my blog reader’s questions, incase unable to reply, I use to set up reminders for that email in my inbox.
Here are the steps to set up a reminder:
- Open Microsoft Outlook Folder >> Select the email for that, you like to get the remainder later.
- Click on Home Tab >> Tags >> Follow up >> Add Reminder
- In the Custom dialog box, you can select the option, that you want to flag: Options are as follows:
- Call
- Do Not Forward
- Follow up
- For your information
- Forward
- No response necessary
- Read
- Reply
- Reply to all
- Review
- Enter the start date and due date (you want to get a reminder)
- Select the date and time from the drop-down menu below the Reminder box, choose the time you want to receive your reminder for getting Sound Notification, and finally click Ok.
In the current scenario, you can select Reply or follow up.
The time slot gives you an interval of 30-minutes, but you can click in the time field and type your own numbers if you want your alert to appear at another time.
You can also change the reminder sound, by clicking the small speaker icon on the right side of the screen. Click on Browse and Navigate the location of the audio file on your computer, click Open and then choose OK to add the file.
You can observe a bell icon, as well as a flag, appears on both sides of that email message. it’s an indicator that reminds you to follow up.
After setting up, you can now get back to your running work, and as soon as the time comes, a popup appears with a sound to remind follow up.
How to Remove & Close reminders?
Once you completed the action and replied to that specific email, you can simply close the reminder notification by selecting the email, Click on Home Tab >> Follow up >> Select Mark Completed.
Both the bell icon and flag icon are removed, and a green tick mark icon appears on the right-hand side of the email, which indicates the reminder process is completed. You can reverse the process to activate the follow-up.
In case you need to remove the reminder follow-up, select that email, Click Home Tab >> Follow up >> Clear Flag. It will remove the follow-up flag from the item.
How To Send An Email Message with Reminder in Outlook?
Sometimes you send an email message to others and what to follow up. This time you need to add a reminder for yourself and the recipient while composing an email message. After adding a reminder to the email message, you can check the response of this email after sending and remind the recipients to remember to do some tasks.
- Click on New Mail from the top left corner of the screen.
- Enter inputs (Email address of recipient, Subject, Content).
- Click on Follow up from the Tags section >> Click Add Reminder.
A custom dialog box appears, which consists of two sections Flag for Me & Flag for Recipients
Check the Flag for Me box:
- Select Follow up from the Flag for me section.
- Select Start Date and the Due date.
- Set Reminder Date and Time.
Check the Flag for Recipients box:
- Select Follow up from the Flag to me section
- Set Reminder Date and Time.
- Click Ok
Now you can see a message appears on the screen, compose your email, and then finally send it. Now on the specified date and time, you and your recipient get a reminder to follow up.
You can also uncheck yourself and just keep your recipient to get a reminder follow-up.
Note: This feature will not work in IMAP accounts, you do even not get Add a reminder in the follow-up section.
Turning emails into Tasks can help you keep track of all those emails & allow you to unclutter your inbox for better focus.
Final Words
In our busy lives, families often forget to take care of important dates and events, such as anniversaries, birthdays, and vacations.
The solution to this problem is a reminder. A reminder is a notification in Outlook that pops up at an appointed date or time to remind you about an important event.