-
Business Letter Writing
Business
Letter
—
layout
I.
Basic Layout: Note the position of
1.
Letterhead
2. The dateline
3. The opening (inside address)
4. The salutation
5. The body
6. The Closing
7. The signature and name
8. P.S. (Postscript)
There are two styles of
composing letters. One is indented style, and the
other is
block style. Nowadays, block
style is more popular especially in business
world.
For
indented
style,
you
should
indented
4
letters
at
the
beginning
of
each
paragraph, and you need not leave space
between paragraphs. While for the block
style, you need to leave space between
paragraphs, but you need not indented 4
letters at the beginning. Just write
along side.
1..
Letterhead
The letterhead
is also called return address, which is the full
address of the writer. It
is typed in
the upper right- hand corner of the first page. In
business world, letterhead
is normally
printed on the top of the letter paper in the
middle. Thus you need not to
write it
again. Just write the date. For personal letter,
you also need not to write the
letterhead.
Notes for
letterhead:
1)
You should be aware of the order you
write letterhead is just reversed from that in
Chinese ,i.e., from the smallest unit
to the biggest unit. For example, the number
of the room, number of the building,
number of the street, city, province and then
the country.
2.
Dates
Be careful!
In China
the 14
th
April 2003 is
written 2003/04/14
In England the
14
th
April 2003 is written
14/4/2003 or 14/04/2003
In America the
14
th
April 2003 is written
4/14/2003 or 04/14/2003
It is probably
safest to write 14
th
April,
2003 or April 14, 2003 !!!
3. The
opening
The
opening
is
also
called
the
inside
address,
which
is
the
address
exactly
the
same
as that on envelope. The opening goes above the
salutation on the left, which is
1
always omitted in personal
letters. The order of the inside address is the
same as the
order
of
letterhead.
While
in
business
world,
if
you
know
the
receivers’
name
and
position, you should
write them before the company name and address.
4
.
The salutation
The
salutation is the greeting, which goes one or two
spaces below the opening at the
left-
hand
margin.
Usually
it
is
best
to
say
“Dear…”
if
you
know
the
name
of
the
receiver,
or just “Dear Sir/Madam” if you do not know the
receiver’s name. Then you
should use a
comma (,) or nothing. We Chinese normally use a
colon (:)
After the salutation, while,
in English letter, colon should not be used. It is
not correct.
In salutation, you still
should pay much attention to the title, Mr. for
male, Mrs.,
Miss,
Ms.
For
female.
They
should
be
followed
by
surname,
family
name.
For
example, Mr. Brown, Mrs. Brown
(husband’s surname), Ms. Smith, Miss White
etc.
Note:
In
China,
people
always
address
the
title
of
one’s
position,
such
as
manager,
director, and teacher etc. In English,
however, these are not the addressing. It is not
correctly used that you write “Dear
Teacher Zhang”, “ Dear Manager Yang”, and so
on and so forth.
5.
The body
It is the most important part of the
letter
—
the content of the
letter. It is one or
two
spaces
bellow
the
salutation.
The
length
of
the
line
should
be
adjusted
to
the
length of the paper. Leave margins on
either side. The paragraph should be blocked or
indented,
according
to
the
style
chosen.
Usually
it
is
single
—
spaced
for
a
business
letter. It usually consists of at least
two paragraphs
—
even if the
second paragraph is
nothing
more
than
“
Thanks
and
best
wishes
to
you,”
or
something.
It
contains
introduction,
purpose and conclusion in the body of the letters.
6.
The
closing
It
is
the
way
of
saying
goodbye.
In
business
writing,
it
is
always
the
complimentary
closing.
There
are
various
of
words
to
choose
in
English
closing.
It
should match the tone established by
the salutation and carried through the body of
the
letter.
It
is
usually
two
spaces
bellow
the
body
of
the
letter,
together
with
the
signature group.
How a
letter is closed depends on how it is opened. The
closing should match the
opening. If
you use a comma (,) after the salutation, you
should use a comma after the
closing.
If you use nothing after the salutation, you also
should use nothing after the
closing.
Dear Sir or Dear Madam
Dear
Sir/Madam
Dear Mr. Smith,
2
Yours faithfully
Yours sincerely,
Dear Mrs.
Wang,
Dear Ms. Lee,
Dear
Rose
Dear Jack
Yours truly,*
Best wishes
With
kind regards
Yours
Love (informal, close friends)
Cordially yours,
7.
The signature and name
The
signature is the last part of a letter. Skip a
line after the closing and sign your
name in
line with
the first word of the
closing.
In business
letters,
you
should sign
your full name.
Your name should be typed also in another line. In
order to make the
people know how to
address
you
when
reply, lady
writers should
list
Mrs. Ms.,
Or
Miss in parenthesis after your name.
However, in personal letters, you can sign your
full name, first name or nick name
according to the relationship with the receivers.
8. P. S. (postscript)
This
should be located at the bottom of the paper. If
you are not on purse forget to
mention
something
in
your
letter,
you
can
write
P.
S.
and
then
just
add
what
you
forget.
There
are some phrases for polite expression:
I would like
to
…
would you
like…,
W
ould you
please…
I will be grateful
if…,
I am afraid that…,
Thank you
for
…
It was kind
of you to have
…
I
wonder if it is possible
that
…
You were
most thoughtful to
…
Please accept my apology for the delay
in sending
…
Certainly, you have every right to
expect better service, and
I
…
1.
Invitation
I would very
much like to invite you for….
Would you please attend
the
annual conference held….
We
will hold a party this weekend. We would like to
invite you to be out guest.
On behalf
of
…
, I am extending to you
our formal invitation to
visit
…
I
have
great
pleasure,
on
behalf
of
…
to
invite
you
to
attend
the
…
on
…
sponsored
by
…
held in(place)
on (date)/from
…
to
…
Accept the invitation:
I accept with my pleasure your kind
invitation….
I would love to
attend your party.
I would like to
visit you….
3
I would be very pleased to….
Refuse the invitation
I
would very much love to take pa
rt in
your party, but ….
I am
sorry that I will have another meeting on that
day, ….
It
is
so
pleased
to
get
your
invitation,
while
I
will
be
on
business
trip
during
that
period.
Sample
letters
Read the samples in the
following parts and write your own letter of the
same type.
1.
Letter of invitation
Commerce
Chamber
46
Woodworth Road
London EC3 5FG
April 8, 2004
Henry Jones
51 Grant Avenue
Toronto, Ont. Canada
M4C 4C9
Dear Mr Jones
We would like to invite you to join us
for the annual sales conference and invite
you to give a talk at the conference on
June 12
th
. The conference
will start at 9:00
am.
More than 500 company
directors are expected to attend.
We would be
very grateful if you could inform us whether you
will be available on
June
12
th
and tell us the topic
of your speech.
Yours sincerely
Helen Henderson
Helen Henderson (Miss) the
Secretary
Exercises 1.4.1-1 :
The
students union will hold a party on this Saturday
at 6:00 at the
students club.
Write an invitation letter
to your English Teacher.
Then exchange
with your partner to check. After that write a
reply to
accept or refuse
.
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2.
Complaint
I must complain
about (that)…
I am not
satisfied with…
I feel
something should be done about…
May
4, 2002
Dear Sir/Madam,
Further to my telephone
call this morning, I would like to write to you
for the
tape-recorder I bought last
month in you shop.
I just used it
only for a week when it broke. I took it to a
local repair shop, they
told us that it
was factory defect and suggested that I take it to
your branch
company in our town. I
waited for more than two weeks, and your company
did not
send a replacement.
I will be grateful if you could replace
the machine for me soon.
Yours faithfully,
James
Christopher
Exercises1.4.1-2:
You bought
a walkman at duty free shop at the airport. You
found
the machine does not work when
you got back home. Write a letter
to
complain.
3. Apology
I am
terribly sorry, but…
I am
afraid I…
I must apologize
for…
Dear
Customer,
I am writing to
you to explain the reasons for the poor service we
have given over the
past
few
months.
I
apologize
for
the
incomplete
delivery
and
no
replies
to
the
inquiries.
I
am
extremely
sorry
for
all
the
inconvenience
caused
by
our
poor
services.
The
main
reasons
lie
in
our
working
procedures
have
not
kept
pace
with
the
expansion of our company. First of all,
we do not have enough staffs to deal with the
deliveries
and
inquiries;
secondly,
our
warehouse
is
not
large
enough
to
store
our
goods; thirdly, our computer systems
are also not so modern as to satisfy the need of
5
company’s
expansion.
I
promise that orders will surely be delivered
promptly and correctly. See to it that we
have already taken some actions. Now we
have already invited more staffs; and we
have already rent a warehouse acquired;
moreover, we have already invested enough
money
to
improve
the
computer
systems
to
cope
with
the
pace
of
the
expansion.
Accordingly, the poor services as
before will not appear anymore.
Yours faithfully,
Henry
Henry, the manager
Exercises1.4.1-3 :
Write a
reply to show the apology about the walkman
mentioned
above, and give your solution
of the problem.
4. Information
Asking for information
Could
you please tell me that…
Could you possibly…
Would it be possible to…
I
would be grateful if you
would. ….
Would you mind
doing…
I wonder if you
could…
I am
writing to you in the hope
of
…
/ to inquire
about
…
Offering
information
It is my pleasure to
….
I would like to tell
you…
We would like to inform
you that….
Thank you for
your inquiry about
…
5. Suggestion
I’d like to
suggest that…
May I suggest
that…
Perhaps we
could…
Could you
please…
Sample
letter
Dear Sir/Madam
I am organizing a group of students to
pay a visit to the historical exhibition in
your town. This visit wil
l
be part of our school’s activities to encourage
the students to
take
part
in
social
surveys.
Therefore,
I
would
be
grateful
if
you
would
supply
me
with the following information:
First of all, what are the
opening and closing dates between which the
exhibition
will be held, and what are
the daily opening hour? Secondly, what is the size
of the
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