We all see this mistake a lot, “please contact with me.”
But I am looking for a good reason why it is incorrect. First I was thinking it is because “with” is for something we do together and contact is more of something one person does to another person.
But then I got to thinking about the phrase “Please get in contact with me.” I can’t really explain why one is OK and one is textbook “Chinglish.”
Any thoughts.
You can only use with when contact is a noun.
Please contact me. In this sentence, contact is a verb.
Please get in contact with me . In this sentence get is the verb, contact is a noun.
Are you allowed to have contact with him? Again, contact is a noun.
contact someone - contact is a transitive verb
in contact - contact is a noun
I’ve always thought visit with to be a bit silly, as in ‘I’m visiting with my parents next week’. If you’re visiting with them, you’re already together, so there’s no need to visit!
You could be visiting somewhere or someone with your parents.
You could be visiting somewhere or someone with your parents.[/quote]
Exactly. But it’s the other meaning that bothers me; I mean, sometimes I can’t sleep at night because of it!
“Visit with” sounds more like “I’m visiting someone with my parents”. ie I’m with my parents and the 3 of us are going to visit a 4th person. Visit with, just meaning me and my parents is indeed a bit odd. Must be a British thing. 
“Visit with” sounds more like “I’m visiting someone with my parents”. ie I’m with my parents and the 3 of us are going to visit a 4th person. Visit with, just meaning me and my parents is indeed a bit odd. Must be a British thing. [/quote]
Nope. It’s in American usage. I always correct it but much to the consternation of the writer.
good luck finding reasons for correct and incorrect preposition usage 
it’s like that because it is
Then there’s “meet” and “meet with”. Usually “meet” (followed by a person) is used for the first time two people see each other (“When Harry met Sally”), and “meet with” is used for more formal meetings between two people whether they’ve met before or not: “President Bush met with Prime Minister Blair to discuss trade relations.”
[quote=“Taichung Social Club”]You can only use with when contact is a noun.
Please contact me. In this sentence, contact is a verb.
Please get in contact with me . In this sentence get is the verb, contact is a noun.
[/quote]
In the second instance “contact” is the noun in a prepostional phrase, and “get” is used in the sense of “become” rather than “acquire.” Give examples of prepositional phrases used as adjectives and as adverbs, and of “get” used to mean both “acquire” and “become.” That should clear things up grammatically.
I’d suggest that perhaps “get in contact with” grew out of “get in touch with” and implies something more like a state of being rather than a single action and so is a vaguely useful distinction largely unobserved by anyone not prone to trolling internet grammar discussions.
I have an aversion to, “I and my family are going to live with my grandmother next week”, when what they really mean is, “We’re gonna dash over to Grandma’s place in Taoyuan on Sunday arvo (early enough to avoid the traffic jam), wolf down the meal she’s spent all day preparing, and then dash home again (early enough to avoid the traffic jam, ha ha), in time for a spot of hard-core cramming for Monday morning’s test.”[ul][/ul]
That’s one some of my family members use. I’d consider it dialectal and classify it as a phrasal verb:
vist with: (phr. v) To sit and chat with a person you are visiting for long periods of time, often accompanied by gossip.
That one actually seems to make sense. One is simply coming together at a certain point in space and time, while the other is coming together at a particular space and time and then holding a meeting.
That’s one some of my family members use. I’d consider it dialectal and classify it as a phrasal verb:
vist with: (phr. v) To sit and chat with a person you are visiting for long periods of time, often accompanied by gossip.[/quote]
I once took a driving test in California (or it may have been Oregon) and the leaflet telling me what to expect informed me that the tester’s job was simply to assess my driving without distracting me. He therefore wouldn’t “visit with me” during the test. I had this lovely image of the tester suddently saying “Hey! My Grandma lives around here. Let’s go visit her.”
BrE vs. AmE? I always remember this one from John Le Carre “The Honourable Schoolboy”(from memory, so maybe not verbatim):
(Speaking of an American “Cousin” (CIA agent) )
“He says he wants to meet with you,” said Guillam, his voice carefully expressionless.
“Did he? Did he really?” said Smiley, “I wonder if it’s the German influence?”
Had to read it a few times to figure out WTH they were talking about i.e. German immigrant influence on American English - remember, George Smiley is a philologist.