Aviva forced to apologise after mass email calls customers 'Michael'
Insurance giant Aviva has been forced to apologise to customers who received emails addressed to Michael, despite not being called so.
The broker, which offers home and car insurance among its products, made the gaffe in an emails sent out last week.
Thousands of customers received the misaddressed email, forcing the insurer to send a subsequent communication addressing the mistake but assuring them no other issues with personal data had been made.
The follow-up email read: "You have recently been sent an email where we mistakenly referred to you as Michael.
"Please be assured that there are no issues with your personal data, the error was caused by a a temporary issue within our email template."
Aviva said customers had nothing to worry about after the error, with a company spokesperson saying: "We sent out some emails last week to existing customers, which, as a result of a temporary technical error in our mailing template, mistakenly referred to customers as ‘Michael’.
"We’ve apologised to these customers and reassured them that the only error in the email was the use of the incorrect name as a greeting.
"There was no issue with personal data; the remainder of the email and its content was correct."