. . . in the distant, early morning . . .

I’d have to completely disagree with you here, Lisa.

There *is* an expectation that people will receive support via Twitter. And people *are* stupid and send account information. Even when people are trying to be smart, and if they had used the message that you’d suggested, they will assume that DMs are secure because they’re “private” and will send passwords or account numbers.

You may be smarter than the average internet user, or perhaps smarter than the average Citibank customer, but the nature of the internet is such that people expect answers instantly, to any feedback in any medium, tailored specifically to their needs.  For every person like you who laments the decline of the English language caused by Twitter and SMS, there’s another user who can’t understand why their !@%*# bank isn’t reading his $!(%* blog post to solve his personal !#(%*# problem.

I agree that “ur” and “plz” aren’t professional, but I still think that your response to the citibank rep was just as rude.  He’s just trying to do his job and being proactive about reaching customers that are expressing frustration.  Those are common abbreviations in the online short messaging space, just as much as LOL and WTF might be.

That said, the “your” and “their” are amateurish.  But I’d take someone who didn’t quite know their homonyms but could solve my banking problems over the reverse.

The language portion being butchered is what bothers me the most. I was trying to do a refinance the other day and when corresponding with their loan officer via email I got this back as a response, “Ok. C u at 1 wed”.

This is unacceptable to me in a text message or twitter format, let alone in an email where these limitations were not needed. I’ve not gone with the company for a few reasons, but this one really hit home.

I can understand that Lisa, myself and Growl are probably more intelligent then most internet users, so I can let that part of the statement slide. However companies need to use full words and spell properly in response to people if you’re trying to get their business.

@growl - We’ll agree to disagree.  I expect banks to be professional, knowledgeable, and courteous.  Typing like a teenager does not convey any of those.  If they are concerned about security, then responding and directing to the 1800 support line is the best thing they can do.

You can be professional, and you can compose brief messages, and you can maintain security - all in 140 characters or less.  I know, it’s not as easy as utilizing “ur” and “plz” (couldn’t they at least use “pls”?) but it is certainly possible.

I don’t believe that I was rude in my response, though the word flabbergasted is certainly true.  I believe that the Citibank rep’s response was rude and discourteous.  Mine was merely shocked.  I admit that could and possibly should have left off the “Are you serious?” part, which likely would have lessened the perception of my own rudeness. 

@cirira - if I saw that in an email I would respond with something like, “Thank you, I’ll be going with another company.  Have a nice day.”

I agree with you, Cirira, that using abbreviations like that in a medium where that’s not a limitation is a definite turnoff.  I certainly wouldn’t want to receive a letter in the mail from a company saying “C Our Gr8 Stuff”.  That would go to the shredder immediately.  And I go out of my way not to use “u” or “ur” in my tweets (I have, on occasion, abbreviated other words).

But that’s not to say that I don’t accept it or even expect it from others.  There’s a tremendous amount of pressure for companies to be reactive to the social space, be it Facebook or Twitter or something we’ve not yet discovered.  As a society and a user population, we have to choose whether or not we let a certain amount of language slide as a result, or we have to change our expectations.  I draw the line at abbreviations in emails and school essays (another well documented and lamentable fact), but when you’ve only got a handful of characters*, I’ll take the responsiveness over the strict accuracy.

* (note that you actually have less than 140, since you also generally have to address the user [@username]).

I still think that companies can respond via Twitter in professional, responsible manner without resorting to sounding like teenagers.  My example of such a response (even shorter without requesting a DM) comes in at well under 140 characters, including the @username syntax.

I’ll leave the argument as to whether we should pander to the need for immediate gratification to another post.  But that’s a fun one, too.  Setting expectations is a large part of support practices; I think this is a classic case.

I’m accustomed to having to truncate what I want to say in my ticketing system at work. The Subject line for our tickets has around 140 characters in it. In these tickets I have to identify the users location, application name, problem, and user id. I understand that it may seem hard to limit yourself to work within the confines of that restriction, but it is possible by rewording what you need to say.

I also think that companies using social media sites to respond to their customers is an intelligent business decision and most likely helps the company in the wrong one, they just need to hold themselves to the same level of professional correspondence that they would in an unlimited medium.

I just realized I butchered part of my sentence there. It should read “and most likely helps the company in the long run”. I’m not sure how I fit wrong one into that sentence.