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Come on our weekend tour!

Visit beautiful Northumberland!

* Visits to castles included

*Comfortable modern buses

*Experienced drivers

£25 per person payable on the day

Call 2184352 to reserve your place

**

Mary went on the weekend bus tour of Northumberland. The tour was a disaster. When she came back she wrote this letter of complaint.

LETTER OF COMPLAINT:

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to you about the tour of Northumberland I went on last weekend.

First, in your advertisement you stated that the cost would include visits to castles. In fact, we had to pay to go into one of the castles.

Secondly, the bus was not as comfortable as you had said it would be. The seats were dirty and several had cigarette burns in them.

Thirdly, the driver had obviously been drinking and almost lost control of the vehicle several times.This could have resulted in a terrible accident.

Therefore, in view of all these problems I would appreciate a complete refund.

I hope to hear from you as soon as possible.

Yours faithfully,

Ms. Mary Jones

Explanation: The letter begins with ‘Dear Sir or Madam’ because Mary does not know the name of the person she is writing to. She might also use ‘To Whom It May Concern’.

The first line of any formal letter must state the purpose of the letter, in this case, to discuss the tour of Northumberland.

Each paragraph deals with one point only, in this case there are three specific complaints, so three core paragraphs.

The letter concludes with the request, or the aim of the letter, ie. to get a refund.

We then end with a stock phrase such as ‘I hope to hear from you as soon as possible’ or ‘I look forward to hearing from you soon’.

When we do not know the name of the person we are writing to, we sign off, ‘Yours Faithfully’. If we know the name, we write ‘Yours Sincerely’ and if we have a prior existing, professional relationship with the person, we use ‘Regards’.

Finally, we sign our name. ‘Mr.’ is for a man. Traditionally we used ‘Mrs.’ to indicate a married woman, and ‘Miss’ for an unmarried woman. However, today we prefer to use ‘Ms.’ for all women as it is completely irrelevant whether she is married or not, much like ‘Mr.’ does not inform us of a man’s marital status.

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