British Company Bans E-MailBritish Company Bans E-Mail

We've all had those days when the relentless pace of communication had us secretly wishing that someone would come and extricate E-mail from our lives. British mobile phone retailer Phones4U has acted on that fantasy by banning the use of E-mail for internal communications among its 2,500 employees.

The company's owner, John Cauldwell, was quoted in numerous U.K. publications as saying that E-mail had become an insidious productivity drain. He estimated that banning internal E-mail communication would save employees as much as three hours a day and that the company would save 1 million pounds a month. The move, he said, was having an immediate and dramatic impact.

But observers in the United States reacted with a combination of confusion and disbelief that a top executive could be so shortsighted. "I don't think it's very realistic," says Masha Khmartseva, an analyst at the Radicati Group. "You can't live without it." The bulk of work done by most information workers is completed in E-mail, Khmartseva says, and even those who complain about the overwhelming flow of E-mail arriving each day still acknowledge its value as a business tool.

Dave Anderson, CEO of E-mail-management vendor Sendmail Inc., took special note of reports that indicate Cauldwell isn't an E-mail user himself. Not only does that show that he might not understand the implications of his actions, Anderson says, but it also brings into question his motives for making such a drastic move. Joked Anderson, "Do I go to the dictionary and look up 'Luddite' or 'publicity stunt'?"