You can send a private message to other registered users of the forum. This works just like email but it's done through the Lay My Hat site, not your own email program.
You can go to your private messaging centre when you are logged in – go to the top of the page and click on 'You have X new message(s)'.
There are three ways to send a private message:
- 1. Go to your private messaging centre and click New Post.
2. If you have received a private message you can click on the 'postreply' button on that message.
3. You can click on the PM link which appears at the bottom of every post, and on every user's profile.
When the person you have written to next logs in to the forum, they will be told they have a message. If they reply to you with a Private Message, the next time you log in you will see at the top 'You have 1 new message' – click on this to go to your private message inbox.
You will see that your Private Message area is like a basic email program, with an Inbox, an Outbox, a Savebox, etc.
When you send a Private Message, the message goes to your Outbox and stays there until the recipient reads it. While the message remains in your Outbox you may edit or delete your post if you like. The message remains in your control until it is received.
The Savebox is for messages you want to keep. To put messages in your Savebox, go to your Inbox and select those you want to keep byt ticking the checkboxes next to them. Then click 'Save Marked'. If you then want to delete the rest of the messages in your Inbox, click on 'Delete All'.
To reply to a message, click on the 'postreply' button. Alternatively you can include the original message in your reply, as you might with email – instead of clicking on the 'postreply' button, click on the 'quote' button to the right. Now you get a message field with the original message already pasted in. You can write your new message above or below it.