ELEMENTS OF A BUSINESS LETTER

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 1145.

II. Read and analyze the following text.

III. Have a discussion on the topic «STRUCTURE OF A BUSINESS LETTER». Use the following questions as a plan.

1. When is a business letter usually used?

2. What does the overall style of letter depend on?

3. What are reasons to write a business letter?

4. Why is the business letter still very useful even today?

5. What kind of structure does a business letter of international standard have?

6. What structural elements does a complete business letter include?

SECTION B

I. Read and learn the following words and word combinations:

1. addressee – адресат

2. attention line – рядок, на який треба звернути особливу увагу

3. blocked style – у вигляді блоків без відступів

4. c.c. (carbon copies) – точна копія

5. courtesy title – титул чемності, ввічливості

6. indented style – з відступом

7. p.p. (per pro) – за дорученням

8. postcode – поштовий індекс

9. private and confidential – закритий та секретний

(1) Letterhead (Sender's address). In correspondence that does not have a printed letterhead, the sender's address is mostly written on the top right-hand side of the page. In the UK, in contrast to the practice in some countries, it is not usual to write the sender's name before the sender's address.

The printed letterhead of a company gives a great deal of information about the type of the company. The name of the Chairman may be given as well as the names of the Directors. Telephone, telex, fax numbers and E-mail address may also be given.

(2) References. References are quoted to indicate what the letter refers to (Your Ref.) and the correspondence to refer to when replying (Our Ref.). References may either appear in figures, e.g. 661/17 which case 661 may refer to the chronological number of the letter and 17 to the number of the department, or, as in the Example 1.2, in letters, DS/MR, in which case DS stands for Donald Sampson, the writer, and MR for his secretary, Mary Rayon. Note that the ‘Your Ref.' given in the Example 1.2 is a date, because B. Kaasen had not mentioned any reference in the original letter.

(3) Date. The date is written below the sender's address, sometimes separated from it by a space. The month in the date should not be written in figures as they can be confusing; for example, 11.1.93 means 11^th January 1993 in the UK but 1^st November 1993 in the USA. Don't abbreviate the month, e.g. Nov. for November, as it looks untidy. Such variants as 24 October, 24^th October, October 24 are matter of preference, but whichever you choose you should be consistent throughout your correspondence.

(4) Special mailing indication. If you send a letter not by an ordinary way, a special note may be written below the date, e.g.:

(5) Confidential. This note means that the letter can be unpacked by an addressee or an agent only. This note is written below the date or the address and on the envelope as well:

(6) Inside address (Receiver's address). This is written below the sender's address and on the opposite side of the page.

- If you know the surname of the person you are writing to, you write this on the first line of the address, preceded by a courtesy title and either the person's initial(s) or his/her first given name, e.g. Mr J.E. Smith or Mr John Smith, not Mr Smith.

Courtesy titles used in addresses are as follows:

Mr [ˈmistə] is the usual courtesy title for a man.

Mrs [ˈmisiz] is used for a married woman.

Miss [mis] is used for an unmarried woman.

Ms [miz] / [məz] is used for both married and unmarried woman.

Messrs [ˈmesəz] is used for two or more men (Messrs P.Jones and B.L.Parker)

Courtesy titles are used with or without a full stop.

- If you do not know the name of the person you are writing to, you may know or be able to assume his/her title or position in the company (The Sales Manager, The Finance Director), in which case you can use it in the address, e.g.:

- You can address your letter to a particular department of the company (The Sales Department, The Account Department), e.g.:

- If you know nothing about the company and do not want to make any assumptions about the person or department your letter should go to, you can simply address it to the company itself (Sountronic Ltd., Messrs Collier & Clerke & Co.).

The order and the style of addresses in the UK is as follows:

Industrial House (name of house or building)

34-41 Craig Road (number of building and name of street, road, avenue, etc.)

Bolton BL4 8TF (name of town/city and postcode)

UNITED KINGDOM (name of country)

Some European addresses may place the numbers of the building after the name of the street, e.g.:

Agentura Carolina

Albertov

128 000 Prague 2

CZECH REPUBLIC

(7) For the attention of. An ‘attention line' is used to draw attention of a certain person to the letter, e.g. For the attention of the Production Manager, Attn. Mr D.Causio.

(8) Salutation. Salutation opens a letter written:

- to a man whose name you do not know Dear Sir

- to a company Dear Sirs

- to a company in the USA Gentlemen

- to a woman, whether single or married Dear Madam

- to a person of whom you know neither the name nor the sex Dear Sir or Madam

If you know the name of the person you are writing to, the salutation takes the form of Dear Mr Smith (not Dear Mr J. Smith or Dear Mr John Smith).

The comma after the salutation is optional.

(9) Subject (Re.:). Some firms open their letters with a subject title. This provides a further reference, saves introducing the subject in the first paragraph, immediately draws attention to the topic of the letter, and allows the writer to refer to it throughout the letter. It is not necessary to begin the subject title with Re: e.g. Re: Application for post of engineer; Non-payment of invoice 322/17.

(10) Body of the letter. This may be indented, as in the letter (Example 1.1), or blocked, as in the letter (Example 1.2). It is a matter of choice. Whichever style you use, you must be consistent and use that style throughout the letter. It is usual to leave a line between paragraphs in the body of the letter; if the blocked style is used, this is essential.

(11) Complimentary close. If the letter begins Dear Sir, Dear Sirs, Dear Madam or Dear Sir or Madam, it will close with Yours faithfully. If the letter begins with a personal name – Dear Mr James, Dear Mrs Robinson, Dear Ms Jasmin - it will close with Yours sincerely, Sincerely. A letter to a friend or acquaintance may end with Yours truly, Best regards or Best wishes. The position of the complimentary close – on the left, right or in the center of the page – is a matter of choice.

(12) Signature. Always type your name after your handwritten signature and your position in the firm after your typed signature, e.g.:

It is a matter of choice whether you sign with your initial(s) (D.Jenkins) or your given name (David Jenkins), and whether you include a courtesy title (Mr, Mrs, Miss, Ms). But in order to avoid misunderstanding concerning your sex it is recommended to use these options in your signature block, as in these two examples:

Sometimes there is the term per pro (p.p.) in signatures. It means for and on behalf of. Secretaries use p.p. when signing letters on behalf of their bosses:

(13) Enclosures. If there are any enclosures, e.g. leaflets, prospectuses, etc., with the letter, these may be mentioned as Enc. or Encl. on the bottom left-hand side of the letter. If there are a number of documents, these are listed:

(14) Copies. c.c. (carbon copies) is written, usually at the end of the letter, when copies are sent to people other than the named recipient (See Business Letter 2 in Appendix 1).

(15) PostScript (P.S.). PostScript is used at the end of the letter to emphasize the most important option of the letter.