4.2. Invitation (informal)

September 15, 2012

Dear Paul,

We're having a Fourth of July get-together at our summer house. Bring your "beach clothes and a good appetite and plan to spend the weekend!

P.S. We'11 pick you up at the airport, of course!

5.1. Thank you "bread and butter letter"

Toledo Park Hotel Cincinnati, OH 222S2 September 15, 1988

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams,

Thank you again for the wonderful weekend! I had such a good time visiting you and your family, and I enjoyed meeting all your relatives. I shall never forget the warm hospitality.

I hope that someday you are able to visit me and my family. I would like to return your kindness and hospitality, and to show you around my hometown.

Please give my respects to all your family.

Sincerely,

Douglas M.White

Business lettrs

6.1 Complaint letter from a business customer to a telephone company

Dear Sir,

I am writing this letter to complain in the strongest terms about the poor service that I have received from your company.

We signed up to your telephone and internet service package two months ago because your advertising suggests that you are better than Telco. In addition, you promise to deal with problems quickly and efficiently, something that Telco were unable or unwilling to do. However, in the first month of service you managed to cause me to lose two days worth of business because of poor administration. The main problem was that you failed to provide me with the correct telephone number, 9818 8747, that you had promised when I completed the contract. This phone number was an established business line which I had been using for the last three years. Obviously this meant that my clients were unable to contact me and it cost me many hours of phone calls to resolve the matter with your support centre.

I would appreciate it if this situation could be resolved and a substantial rebate offered on my first three month's account.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yours faithfully,

John O'Sullivan

6.2 Complaint letter from business to business.

Dear Mr Thompsen,

I recently received a letter from a Mr Robinson, a valued customer of ours. He purchased an Italian coffee table and four French dining-room chairs from us which your company delivered to his residence.

He has written to complain that the purchases arrived damaged. We pride ourselves in the quality of our products and would like an explanation as to how this mishap occurred. Even though the items are insured, our reputation is at stake.

I would be most grateful if you would reply as soon as possible so that this matter can be resolved to everyone's satisfaction.

Sincerely,

Jackie Middleton

Customer Services Manager

6.3 Sample Business Letter

3519 Front Street Mount Celebres, CA 65286

October 5, 2004

Ms. Betty Johnson Accounts Payable The Cooking Store 765 Berliner Plaza Industrial Point, CA 68534

Dear Ms. Johnson

It has come to my attention that your company, The Cooking Store has been late with paying their invoices for the past three months.

In order to encourage our customers to pay for their invoices before the due date, we have implemented a discount model where we'll give you 2% off your invoice if you pay us within 10 days of receiving the invoice.

I hope that everything is going well for you and your company. You are one of our biggest customers, and we appreciate your business. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me at (555) 555-5555.

Sincerely,

Signature

Bob Powers Accounts Receivable

Task . Read and translate the information about common mistakes while writing letters.

Common Mistakes in Letter Writing

Mistake #1: Not identifying the purpose of the letter.

Whether your letter is for business or personal communications, you should state in the beginning what the letter is about. For example, you are requesting a refund for a broken product or you are following up on a proposal. Even if you are just "saying hello" to Aunt Jane, state the purpose of your letter early on. That way Aunt Jane will know to read with enjoyment as you tell her the latest events in your life, or whether to read fervently to the end for the delivery of some horrible bad news. When you don't identify the purpose for your writing, the recipient may not place the proper priority or urgency to your letter or, in the case of business, may direct it to the wrong department thus delaying your refund or prolonging a decision.

Mistake #2: Not getting to the point.

Just as when you don't identify the purpose for your letter, not getting to the point risks having the recipient miss the intended message entirely. If you're really writing to resolve a specific problem, don't spend three paragraphs apologizing in advance or talking about unrelated issues. Also known as disorganization, not getting to the point turns a bad letter into a missed opportunity.

Mistake #3: Redundancy.

There are several types of redundancy, and all of them are equally unnecessary. The first, and easiest to identify, is using the same word more than once in the same sentence or more than three times in the same paragraph. An example is "She added a personal touch to the personal letter she wrote." The second type of redundancy that many writers miss in their own writing is repeating the same idea in different words: "Her message was effective because it was personal. The personal nature of her letter made her message effective." This message is not effective - it's redundant.

Mistake #4: Using unfamiliar acronyms, abbreviations or technical language.

Don't assume your audience knows all the abbreviations, lingo and acronyms that you know. An acronym is word formed from the initial letters of a name, such as CHOP for Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. The same letters can stand for different organizations or meanings depending on where the person lives or other frame of reference. Or they simply may not know what it stands for. The same goes for technical language or jargon specific to a given profession, industry or interest group and for abbreviations beyond the basic Mr./Ms. and etc. And it's probably okay to use OK.

Mistake #5: Using ambiguous or confusing words.

Similar to avoiding acronyms try to choose words with clear meaning, especially if your letter is attempting to resolve a conflict. Ambiguous subjects or misplaced descriptive phrases can totally change the intended meaning of your words. If you are having trouble identifying your own ambiguity, try writing your major points in very simple subject-verb-object format. Even if it feels childish, this exercise will actually spell out for you the key players and actions you want to communicate. You can fill in details and modify the sentence structure - after you are clear about what you need to say.

Mistake #6: Monotonous sentence structure.

Counterbalance to mistake #5, you don't want to bore your audience to sleep either. Writing every sentence in the same exact structure and length is amateurish and disruptive to the flow of the letter. Vary sentence length and alter noun-verb order to add interest to your message.

Mistake #7: Inconsistency.

Variety, however, should not be confused with inconsistency. There are two things that generally should not vary within a sentence or even within your letter: person and tense. Person refers to first (me, I, we), second (you) and third (he, them, etc.). Tense pertains to verbs or action happening in the past, present or future. Of course, there are always exceptions to this rule, such as occasions where "I" am telling "you" how "I" feel. Inconsistency applies to technique as well as meaning. If you are sending mixed messages, the only sure outcome of your letter is confusion.

Mistake #8: Fragments, run-on sentences and missing or incorrect punctuation.

A lot of people have heard of a fragment but don't recognize it when they write one. A fragment is simply not a complete sentence. Commonly used fragments are noun phrases (the man with the short beard and navy jacket), verb phrases (walking through the park and over the hill), and prepositional phrases (on a tree stump within the national park reserve). Run-on sentences have the opposite problem: they are defined as two complete sentences not separated with proper punctuation such as a period, comma-and, colon, or semi-colon. Punctuation deserves an article of its own, but common problem areas are possessive pronouns vs. contractions ("its" is the correct possessive pronoun, while "it's" is a contraction for "it is"), hyphen vs. dash (a hyphen combines two words into one whereas a dash is used to separate words to distinguish multiple ideas or phrases), and misplaced commas. Items in a series should have a comma after each item. A comma before the word "and" at the end of the series is optional, but do not ever use a comma after the word "and". That is a misplaced comma.

Mistake #9: Bad spelling and misused words.

It ought to go without saying; misspelled words are a common mistake in letter writing. Not only does bad spelling make you look unprofessional, it also gives the reader the impression that you don't know what you are talking about. If they don't believe you, your communication is ineffective. If you are using a computer, be sure to run a spelling and grammar check at least once. Do not, however, rely on spell check alone. You should know by now, software programs do not identify correctly spelled words that are used incorrectly in the context of the sentence. A notorious example is the transposition of the words "from" and "form". Also, most software does not recognize proper names or some technical or industry-specific terminology. If you are not paying attention, your software editor may change a word you spelled correctly to something completely different -- while you are not looking!

Mistake #10: Not reading it over before you send it.

The last example is an excellent reason to be sure to re-read your letter before sending it to anyone. Even if you think your letter is free of human error (which would be rare!), your letter may have been corrupted by computer error or unintentional (and sometimes misfortunate) auto-formatting. No matter what, read your letter through from beginning to end at least one time. Keep an eye out for all the common mistakes above, and make sure you have thoroughly supported your points. Follow these few strands of advice and you are sure to produce a well-written letter that will communicate the message you intend to convey and hopefully, achieve the results you desire.

Task VI. Use the samples of Business Letters and information about Common Mistakes above to correct the following letter. Correct all spelling and grammar errors. Make the necessary format changes and identify the parts of a business letter.

1002 Mark Lane

Chatsworth, CA 91311

December 3, 2005

Mr. Michael Imchin

10027 Lark Lane

Chatsworth, CA 91311

Dear Ms. Imchin:

My name is Raquel Rose and I writting you this letter to address the trash that is cluttering the streets in the city of Chatsworth. The streets that I am concerned about are Desoto and Devonshire. I understand that yous the manager of Chatsworth’s Clean Streets Project and I felt that it was important that I address my koncerns to you. I know that the city cut your budget in half last August and that this has put a strain on your budget? It must be impossible to cover all the streets in Chatsworth with half a staff. I am asking that you concentrate on the street mentioned above because these are the streets that are the heaviest with traffic.

Many peoples that live outside of Chatsworth drive this streets everyday to get to work. I am afraid that they are getting a bad impression of what Chatsworth really looks like.

If it is not possible to concentrate your manpower to these streets, and I ask that you reach out for volunteers to help keep these streets clean. I am a member of student body at my school and I know that I can gather many of my friends to help you with this project. We have also met many times at skool and have come up with other ideas to clean our streets. if you are interested in us helping you or our ideas, please contact me at the address listed above.

Sincerely,

R.Rose

Task VII. Read and translate the letter. Using the information “Common mistakes in Letter Writing” correct the mistakes concerning the purpose of the letter, punctuation, format, etc.

UEFA Stadium Construction committee

To: Mr. John Ericson

From: Football club “Shahter” (Donetsk)

The registration number and date: №490, August the 3rd, 2006.

Topic: Invitation to a presentation

Dear Mr. Ericson!

As you already know, that Football Club “Shahter”(Donetsk) is about to build new 5 stars stadium, which meets all official UEFA requirements and has no analogue in Ukraine. Recently the new tender realization process has been completed and we are glad to present to you the General contractor.

In connection with the foregoing, we would like to invite one of the UEFA Stadium Construction committee members to the presentation of General project contractor of FC “Shahter”, which will take place in the hotel «Donbass Palace» at 13:00 p.m., June 26, 2006.

FC «Shahter» takes upon itself all the travel expenses including transfer, meals, and accommodation.

Thank you in advance.

Looking forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

Andrey Torunov

The Director of Sales, Marketing and Communications department

FC «Shahter» (Donetsk)

Task VIII. a) Below is a formal letter. You must decide which of the phrases in bold you think are most appropriate and adjust the letter to make it suitable.

My Name

My Road

My Town

Dear Mr Sexton,

I thought I’d write/ I am writing to complain about the state of the yard/condition of the playground. Over the last two weeks, I have noticed loads of rubbish/a great deal of litter.

I reckon/It is my opinion that this litter is a health hazard. For example, yesterday a year 4 boy fell over and cut his hand on a broken bottle. The boy I’m talking about/The boy in question needed four stitches.

Furthermore/On top of this, the litter is an eyesore. Our school has beautiful views of the river and these are wrecked/spoiled by the litter.

I believe/I reckon that there are a load of things/a number of things that you could do to fix/rectify this problem. Firstly, it may be possible for you/you could purchase additional litterbins. This would help stop/prevent people discarding their litter recklessly/willy-nilly.

What’s more/In addition, I think that our school needs better/more adequate security to prevent vandals littering.

To finish/In conclusion, I hope you will take my concerns seriously and I look forward to your reply/you writing back to me.

Yours Sincerely/Yours Faithfully

Name Here

b) Now try to find the correct phrases in this informal letter. Remember, this is for your friend.

Dear James,

How are you?/I trust this letter finds you well. I’ve been dead busy/extremely busy since your last letter. We have to work really hard at school to get ready/in preparation for our SATs.

Despite this, I did manage to play/partake of a game of football last night with my friends/acquaintances. We won/were victorious! It was boss/outstanding!

Also, my dad got me/purchased for me a new mobile telecommunication device/mobile phone. It’s an 8210!

Anyway, gotta go/go to cease writing! Speak to you soon. Please write back/please respond swiftly.

Love from

My Name.