Slow, poor quality email responses are failing UK customers, according to research from eService provider Transversal.

The study has uncovered a growing crisis in email response, with responses by customer service staff to email found to be much less effective at providing a satisfactory answer than using an automated online system or phoning a contact centre. 

• Less than half (46 per cent) of the routine customer service questions emailed to 100 leading organisations were answered adequately. 
• Additionally, the average time to respond to email was nearly 4 days (46 hours), with just over a quarter of organisations not replying at all. 
• However, proving that fast, accurate responses by email are possible, some companies responded with useful answers within 10 minutes.

Online Connect IT comment:
If you’re a small or medium sized business, a response to email within 10 minutes is probably impractical, but a response within a specified amount of time is a must if you want to keep customers. Whether you can promise to respond within 1 hour, or 24 hours, make sure you have a policy for answering email, and that you stick to it.

It’s also important to let your customers know how long it will take for you to respond to emails – if it’s that urgent, they might want to pick up the phone and contact you the old fashioned way.

If you’re not on email yet, what are you waiting for? – it’s where the future’s at. See our Q&A section on Email – getting connected.

Read more on the research from Transversal