"The reason was that many of the high-tech firms have built their own systems for responding to e-mails, and because the volume has gone up tremendously in the past year, they're finding they just can't cope with the increased volume," he said. "Their volume of e-mail has grown more than companies in most other industries, because their customers are online more."

Golesworthy said his team conducted a test about a week before Thanksgiving and e-mailed numerous questions to computer companies asking for advice about making a purchase. He was surprised by how long it took for them to respond.

"We were getting responses back after Christmas, by which time [a typical customer is] either not interested or [has] bought one," he said. "In 2006, there are a lot of companies with rearchitecture plans in place because e-mail has become more important, or critical, to them."

Here are some of the other findings of the report:

- All company Web sites now provide an online privacy policy, and 48 percent of those policies have a friendly tone.