Bad business

I am going to have a wee grumble. I've been stewing over this for a while now, and it's time I let it out.

The Man and I sometimes help out friends who do business with companies overseas. Generally this is small scale, and involves writing business letters and emails, with the occasional phone call. Nothing too difficult, you would think.

However, we often run into a problem. This problem is that many business people, apparently, cannot read. I send an email asking a question, and the person at the other end fires back a response answering a different question altogether, or asking for information that was contained in the email I just sent.

I am currently in the middle of one such series of miscommunications.

(Details edited out - The Man tells me we must not risk the transaction falling through, so even though I think I was fairly anonymous about it, the Japan link could make it obvious. A small risk, but not worth taking. Maybe I'll add it in again later. Anyway...)

I am getting really tired of this. A simple transaction is taking FOREVER. I wish I could say that this particular transaction is an exception, but it isn't. It happens all the time.

Also, a pattern is emerging. From my limited experience, I can tell you this:

Countries where English is spoken are the worst, with the exception of New Zealand. I don't know why, unless I just got lucky. I have dealt with two or three NZ companies and never had any problems. I would be proud of this, except that why should I be proud of normal behaviour?

The U.S. is the worst in terms of simple business etiquette, and I can't blame email for this. On one memorable occasion before we had email, a response to a fax I sent was my own fax sent back with a scrawled, difficult-to-read note in the margin and an arrow pointing to the question it was answering. The question was answered, but showing it to our client was embarrassing, it was so unprofessional. This was an extreme example, but unbusinesslike responses are not unusual. The tone is not professional, questions are not answered fully, and most of the time if there is more than one question they are not answered at all.

The same goes for companies in the U.K.. People apparently do not read emails to the end, and nor do they read them properly. Responses from the U.K. tend to be more professional in tone, but the content is no better.

When we dealt with a company in India the responses were extremely polite, professional, and to the point, and all our questions were answered promptly. (As a bonus, at Christmas we were sent the most hilariously kitch animated e-card you can imagine.)

A French company I dealt with recently responded less professionally, but it was clear from their writing that they did not know very much English. In fact the website was in French, and I hadn't been sure that they would respond at all. However, all questions were answered, and the transaction went perfectly smoothly despite the language barrier. I was impressed.

Can anybody tell me what is going on? I am generally dealing with office staff here, not the people at the top. I don't know whether they are called secretaries any more, but basically they are people doing secretarial work. (The exception is the American guy above, who was the owner, and I suspect the entire staff, of the company.)

What really puzzles me is that people who do this sort of work are making their jobs far more difficult for themselves, and making it less likely that they will succeed in doing business.

WHAT IS GOING ON?

(More edited out. Sorry.)

I would use a different company, except that the other three companies I wrote to enquiring about similar products did not even grant me the courtesy of responding to my enquiries.

I hereby send out two requests to all native English-speaking business people:

1. PLEASE LEARN TO READ AND WRITE. Alternatively, hire somebody who can. A person who can compose professional, businesslike letters addressing your clients concerns in full will do wonders for your company's image in the international business world.

2. PLEASE DO NOT PUT UP A WEBSITE WITH A SPECIAL FORM FOR ENQUIRIES IF YOU HAVE NO INTENTION OF RESPONDING TO THE ENQUIRIES YOU ARE SENT.

Thank you.