Talk:Business letter/Archives/2012

bigger pictures

Since the author him/herself provided the picture of the English letter, could we get a bigger version? It and the German letter are completely illegible now. --Espoo 12:16, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Who cares?

With regards to this page not being typed in an "encylopedic tone", I doubt this is the reason it was created. I think it should remain to help people write these letters.

• It isn't very helpful the way it is written. I agree that it should be rewritten to provide the information in a better format. Mil97036 17:45, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
• I've made modifications to the article to put it in more of an informational tone and less of a 'how to' tone.

Example

You know, while looking for help myself, I just needed to see an example... which to my surprise, there isn't one. Colonel Marksman 20:12, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

There are so many variations on a standard letter and so many opinions that, frankly, if an example was put up then it would probably end up being edited and reverted until everyone got fed up and removed it completely, whereupon someone would complain that there wasn't an example. Letter style is as much a question of personal taste as punctuation, see Truss, Lynne (2005-10-31). Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation. Profile Books Ltd. ISBN 978-1861976772. Why not check out some of the citations at a library? Additional references to some actual letter style manuals wouldn't go amiss though.--Shakujo 00:47, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

• I don't think I was understood. There ARE parts to a business letter (is what I mean).

No matter how a business letter is written, there is still an inside address, body, and closing (and occassional PS). The content of the letter and the wording itself is irrelevant, and could even remain blank, or have explainatory sentences. The fact is, a business letter has certain properties to it you don't see in an informal letter. THAT is what I needed to see. Example: http://www.qofp.com/letters.htm. Colonel Marksman 05:25, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

As I said some further references wouldn't go amiss, which is exactly what this is. I note that the website in your example takes information from "Book 5, Basic Skills in English, McDougal, Littell & Company, 1981", a reference that is entitled to copyright protection, so we need to be careful not to infringe it, as per Wikipedia:Copyrights.--Shakujo 06:47, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

• I think you will also find that many of the features you have listed are missing from some business letters, that doesn't make them not business letters. Style is now and will always be a question of taste. As Burchfield states in the introduction of Burchfield, R W (1998). The New Fowler's Modern English Usage. Clarendon Press Oxford. pp. xi. ISBN 0-19-860263-4. examples and style guides merely attempt to:

  "... guide readers to make sensible choices in linguistically controversial area of words, meanings, grammatical constructions, and pronunciations."

  Therefore, there is only a choice; there is no right or wrong answer, except that a "business letter" concerns "business" and that a letter written in a "business-style" is merely written in a formal tone appropriate to the person receiving the letter. The content of this article is just the generally accepted view of what most people think a "business letter" is.
  To deride an encyclopedia article for presenting a view held by a large number of verifiable sources, written by acknowledged experts in the field is unhelpful. As I said why not help by adding sources to the actual article? --Shakujo 07:25, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Capitalization

I noticed that the optional items are capitalized in the "Parts of a Business Letter" section (RE, CC, ENC) but are in mixed case or lower case in the "Business Letter Layout Guidelines" section (Enc, cc). Are they truly interchangeable, or are they supposed to be in a particular case? Brien Clark 00:45, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Left-Blocked?

I've actually never heard the term "left-blocked format," and a search online seems to mostly return matches in computer manuals or government pages. I couldn't find a definition for left-blocked. I assumed it's the same as "flush left" but in thinking about it and looking at Typographic_alignment, perhaps it means "left justify?" I just thought we should use clearer language and/or link to a Wikipedia article that explains what "left-blocked" means. I would change it myself, but I'm honestly not sure what it means.Dculberson 15:52, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

• I'm pretty sure that it means you do not indent, I could be wrong though. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.4.170.73 (talk) 02:03, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

• The correct term is "full block" Michael.Urban (talk) 18:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Merge from letter of inquiry

Letter of inquiry is a brief stub example of a business letter. Thought it might be good to merge it here as a type of business letter. --Busy Stubber 18:07, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Why only the American style/layout?

I want to write a business letter in the UK but this article only has an example of the American style:( —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.150.251.249 (talk) 21:06, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Ideas for improvement

This article could benefit from having several different examples of different styles of business letters, as well as what circumstances were appropriate for each style. It also seems that the article could benefit from explaining the differences in style between the U.K. and the U.S.Jonnyhottrod (talk) 05:34, 18 January 2009 (UTC)Jonnyhottrod

Automated date in example letter

I've used the template {{FULLDATE}} to automate the date in the example. Hopefully that will keep people from feeling like they have to update it manually (although it is based upon UTC, so it will sometimes be a day off for some people.) --| Uncle Milty | talk | 18:08, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

2" Margin

No sources here, but I thought that the top margin can be 2 Inches. Can anyone confirm/bust this?

24.128.124.180 (talk) 22:39, 20 May 2011 (UTC)VTM

Layout

The Layout of a business letter used to be on the page. Why is it no longer there. I'd like to put it back in but I don't want to anger anyone one if it was removed for a reason. What is the communities thought? Etineskid(talk) 01:04, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi, you can ignore my request for thoughts I realized the edit was from an IP with a history of bad edits I restored the content and warned the IP. Etineskid(talk) 01:39, 19 February 2012 (UTC)