Getting notifications when adding comments to an Office file

Using the Comments feature in Office is a great way to collaborate on a file, and to provide additional context and information. However, it’s entirely possible that someone may add a comment where your input would be valuable, and you might never see it. Now Office files will sent out a notification if your name is mentioned using the @ symbol. Here’s how that works…

Using Excel as an example, I will add a comment to the spreadsheet by clicking on Review > New Comment:

In the Comment box, I add a name (in this case, mine) prefaced by the @ symbol. You’ll get a dropdown list of matching names when you start to type a name after the @. Once you have a proper name and you’ve added your comment, click the Send icon:

The comment is now part of the spreadsheet, and it shows my name as the targeted recipient of that comment:

In a few minutes, I receive an email stating that I’ve been @-mentioned in the comments of a file, and I get a link to go to the file and respond: