Phones 4U has banned its 2,500 staff from emailing each other, Ananova says. John Caudwell, the owner of the mobile phone retailer, reckons the move will save his employees three hours a day (three hours?!) and his company at least a £1m a month in time saved.

Caudwell told the Press Association: "I saw that email was insidiously invading Phones 4u so I banned it immediately.

"Management and staff at HQ and in the stores were beginning to show signs of being constrained by email proliferation - the ban brought an instant, dramatic and positive effect."

Staff are still allowed to respond to external emails, he said. That should ward off any complaints on human rights grounds...

Presumably too, the ban can't extend to all internal emails. A former phones 4U employee writes: "email is how the stores communicate with HR, Repairs, Returns and so on - this has not been banned. Things such as getting a cyber-bollocking from the Area Manager might have been curbed, but day to
day ops stuff can't and hasn't." ®