Some people always tell me to avoid using abbreviations that often used in forum talk, AKA "Internet Slang", in semi formal written conversation. Of course, I would never use the phrase TTYT, TTYL, LOL, YSVW, YW in my email.
IMHO, it is still appropriate to use abbreviation as long as it is very well known and does not contain inappropriate meaning. AFAIR, phrases like BTW, ASAP, FYI, CMIIW and etc. are often appears in my email with customers. YMMV.
What's your suggestion? How do you decide if particular abbreviation is appropriate or not to be used in semi formal written conversation (email) ?
TIA.
Best Answer
Never use such abbreviations especially when writing to your customer, no matter how close you are with them. Apart from sounding casual, you also risk the possibility of the client inferring you're too busy (to write complete words) even for your customers. How I hate it when people sign off with a BR (=best regards, supposedly).
Having said that, I think it's perfectly valid to use abbreviations that expand to nouns, such as WHO, FBI, WWW etc, and some latin derivatives such as N.B. and P.S.