Yes, you definitely do. Especially if you are dealing with questions about work or education. Email is the preferred method of communication when dealing with different organisations.
Many companies, authorities, but also civil associations and commercial companies clearly prefer this way of communication. In Slovakia, banks, doctors, insurance companies, interest associations, schools, organisations providing language courses, employers and colleagues at work communicate with you by e-mail.
Through e-mail you can receive information about activities that interest you, about events that are happening in your area, e-shop information, get prescriptions for medicines, make appointments at the office or at the doctor’s office, apply for university and, last but not least, apply for a job.
Mareena also prefers email communication when organising language courses and various events. When you register for any event or language course, expect a reply or confirmation via email.
Setting up an e-mail box
You can set up an email account for free on various platforms. The most common companies that provide the possibility to set up an e-mail box in Slovakia include: Google (gmail service), Zoznam, Azet, Post.sk, Centrum. You can also set up an e-mail directly on your mobile phone or tablet and always have information from it at hand.
The e-mail address for formal communication should contain your first and last name. It is not advisable to use an email address containing nicknames or diminutives for official communication.
For example, a person with the name Karol Vysoký might consider such email addresses:
karol.vysoky@gmail.com (or another domain, see above, not necessarily gmail)
k.vysoky@gmail.com
vysoky.karol@gmail.com
karolvysoky@gmail.com
vysokykarol@gmail.com
Each email you want to send contains three parts:
- To: the email address of the person, organization or company you want to contact
- Subject: a few words, but no more than one short sentence, describing what to expect in the email itself – something like the title of an article/post. (e.g. “application for a language course”, or “interest – Warehouseman position”)
- The email body: the space where you write the text with the information you want to send. E.g. if you are looking for a job, write what kind of job you are looking for and what experience you have (shortened cover letter).
Your email can look like this:
Tips for effective use of email communication
If you enter your email somewhere, make sure it is entered correctly. It often happens in practice that when you register for language courses or other events, for example, the address you give is incorrect. Therefore, you will not receive the information you are waiting for.
Please check your email inbox daily or every two days. If you only check it once a week, or even less often, you might not get the latest information – you might miss an important deadline, lose your place on a course, or not get to an event you were looking forward to. Ideally, your email inbox is updated on your mobile phone. If you have notifications set up, you can see immediately on your phone that a new message has arrived.
Don’t forget to sign in. Email is a bit like a letter – you need to sign it, especially if your address doesn’t in any way indicate your name. Some requests can certainly be dealt with without knowing the name of the person writing to you, but there are also cases where this is not possible and your email may go unanswered.
Emails without a salutation, signature and from a random address (e.g. anib2587@gmail.com) often go unanswered because they are considered unserious in many companies and offices.
