Email Over-Familiarity Breeds Contempt

A recent poll has revealed some of our pet hates when it comes to email communication. According to the Staples UK/OnePoll survey, office workers are singularly unimpressed with spelling and grammatical errors, with 65 percent saying they would see such errors as ‘shoddy’ and ‘have no faith’ in the sender.

Fifty-eight percent said they felt irritated by and wouldn’t do business with people who went on holiday without sorting out an ‘out of office’ reply email.

Other unpopular email practices include:

• kisses (xxx) on emails to clients (cited by 66 percent of respondents)
• smiley faces on emails to clients (44%)
• terms of endearment to clients, e.g. ‘honey’ (54%)
• abbreviations like ‘OMG’ (50%)
• lines like ‘Happy friday’ (28%)
• enquiring after clients’ weekend plans (17%)