When and how often to follow up on LOR requests?

[EmilySpinach]

I sent out my LOR requests well ahead of time and happily all three agreed but now I'm two weeks out from my deadline and so far none of them have uploaded the letter.  Is that pretty typical?

I'm thinking I should follow up with a friendly reminder but I don't want to seem too pushy.  Although in one book I read about grad school admissions they recommended following up weekly (!!!).

I was also hoping for feedback on my SOP and nobody's sent me that either and I kind of feel like I really need to be working on my final draft now....am I being way too timid?

[rising_star]

I wouldn't be that worried two weeks out. 

[fuzzylogician]

Depending on when you last emailed your recommenders, you might send a reminder and ask when you could expect feedback on your SOP. You could also say something in your email along the lines of "if I don't hear back, I'll follow up again in a week," although it's not clear to me that that's needed. Some professors do appreciate getting periodic reminders, but they will tell you so, and without knowing that, there is a good chance that you'll just be annoying them unnecessarily. This said, it being two weeks out, I wouldn't worry at all about the fact that none of them have submitted the letters yet. A lot of profs will do it last minute.

[random_grad]

2 hours ago, EmilySpinach said:

they recommended following up weekly

this is utterly senseless. a friendly reminder 1 week prior should be enough unless one of them is on sabbatical now. then send the prof who's on sabbatical an email now.

 

also, what fuzzylogician said.

[Neist]

2 hours ago, rising_star said:

I wouldn't be that worried two weeks out. 

I agree.

I sent mine reminders every 2-3 weeks, maybe? Not terribly often, and not at all until it was a month and a half or so from deadlines (I had asked some writers nearly a year in advance). 

3 hours ago, EmilySpinach said:

I'm thinking I should follow up with a friendly reminder but I don't want to seem too pushy.  Although in one book I read about grad school admissions they recommended following up weekly (!!!).

Was is it the book by Asher? He seemed pushy to me. I would never do some of the things he asked. Asher wrote that if a POI doesn't respond to emails then you should politely keep spamming them to a level that I consider borderline harassment.

If you haven't attempted to contact your writers for a while, I'd politely send them a reminder, but I'd do it in a way where it doesn't seem to be the point of the email. Tell them you've polished up your statement and wanted to send them a copy in case they wanted to see it. Something like that.

It's not uncommon for letter writers to wait until the last day or two to submit their letters.

[EmilySpinach]

On 1/29/2016 at 4:24 PM, Neist said:

Was is it the book by Asher? He seemed pushy to me. I would never do some of the things he asked. Asher wrote that if a POI doesn't respond to emails then you should politely keep spamming them to a level that I consider borderline harassment.
 

It was the book by Asher! 

So I did follow up but no response from anyone - I guess I'll try again a couple days before the deadline and just work on my SOP without the benefit of their advice.  Oh wells - as long as they get the LORs in.

[ts1493]

I would probably try to reach out one more time a week out from applications.  If all three are professors chances are they are just really busy with the start of the semester, but all the more reason to check in once more.  Something like "I hope you're well.  Things are moving forward with my application and I'm getting ready to submit, just wanted to make sure there is nothing more you need from me in order to submit the letter of recommendation by xxxx date.  Thanks again for supporting my application!"  I think I would be nervous to leave it to just a couple days before the deadline.