When you email parents and guardians, only the contacts you have set up to receive communication actually get the email. The "Parental Responsibility" setting is one thing that affects who receives an email, but ticking it on its own does not guarantee delivery. This article explains how "Parental Responsibility" relates to email delivery and what else a contact needs to receive your emails.
You can see each contact's status on the student's profile. Open the student and look at the contact cards under "Key Contact Details". Each card shows two separate indicators, "Parental Responsibility" and "Receives Communications", with a green tick when the setting is on and a red cross when it is off.
These are two different settings. A contact can have "Parental Responsibility" ticked and still not receive your emails, because delivery also depends on "Receives Communications" being on. In the example above, both contacts have "Parental Responsibility" ticked, but only the first has "Receives Communications" ticked, so the second contact will not be emailed.
If a contact has "Parental Responsibility" ticked but is not receiving emails, check the following:
- "Receives Communications" is ticked for that contact.
- The contact has a valid email address on their record.
- The contact has not unsubscribed from your emails.
- The email you sent was not narrowed by a recipient filter that excluded them.
When you compose an email, the "Set Up" panel includes recipient filters that narrow who the email goes to. Turning on "Only include contacts where Parental Responsibility is ticked" sends the email only to contacts who have "Parental Responsibility" ticked. The "Priority numbers" and "Only include contacts that live with the student" filters narrow the list further, so a contact with "Parental Responsibility" ticked can still be left out if they do not match the other filters you have selected.
- Leaving all the filters off sends to every contact who is set up to receive communication.
- Each filter you turn on removes contacts who do not match it, so the more filters you apply, the fewer contacts receive the email.