Topic: Online manners important to Brits

[Clive]

March 13, 2006
Web User

British internet users are offended if they don't receive an instant reply to emails they send, according to a new study.

Telewest's Digital Etiquette study reveals that almost half of office workers in the UK would consider it rude if they hadn't received a reply to an email within a few hours.

Five per cent find it rude to not receive an email response within five minutes of sending it, while two out of every five people would expect a response to a text message within an hour before considering it rude. Almost a quarter of people would expect a response within five minutes to an instant message.

According to other findings, email is a vital tool in the office as 78 per cent of respondents claimed they couldn't live without it in the workplace for gossip and socialising or personnel to human resources and financial discussions.

Stephen Beynon, managing director of NTL:Telewest Business, said: "The British are renowned for their manners, so it is important that, as and when these tools become more widely known, businesses give guidelines to their staff on how to use them efficiently."

Less than one in ten said that SMS texts and instant messaging could be useful at work for human resources issues, financial discussions and communicating with senior management.

[Simon]

Yes, I find it immensely irritating when people don't reply to e-mails and texts, even if just to say OK.  At least then I know they have received the message.

[sam]

...yeah but you could also turn on delivery reports.

[Simon]

[sam]

.. im the same though simon... but my knew phone tells me by default via symbols in my outbox.. which is pretty cool.