“For your convenience.” Just contemplating that phrase generates a flare of irritation and bad memories. “For your convenience, we no longer offer phone support.” “For your convenience, you must now walk around the building to enter.” “For your convenience, we can offer you a four-hour appointment window.” And so on.

I assume businesses and institutions do this because they imagine that telling us something is convenient will make us believe that it is—even if that notion runs counter to our direct experience. (I assume that because the only other alternative is to assume that they want to make an annoying situation doubly annoying by presenting it as a favor.) This is delusional, bordering on moronic.

Lying to your customers—or implying that your definition of their experience trumps theirs—is never the way to get them to support, or at least accept, new practices or difficult changes. I can’t believe I feel compelled to point this out, but the phrase appears to have become a convention—and anyone who uses it should know that it will inject an odor of bad faith into the entire customer relationship.

If you need to make a change that people won’t like, be honest, and explain why you need to do it. (Even “For our convenience …” would be better, and might generate a laugh.) If it will benefit customers in the long run, say so—as long as you have a credible case. People may still be annoyed, but at least they won’t be insulted by your dishonesty to boot.