Addressing a Business Letter

[cathsl7]

Hello Everyone,

I have a question that I thought I new the answer to. What is the officially correct way to address a business letter.

I have always used this formula. Please let me know if I am mistaken....my new boss insists his way is correct

My way:

Company Name
Attn: Mr. Right
Street address
CSZ


His way:
Company Name
Street Address
CSZ
Attn: Mr. Right


Please help settle this silly but touchy situation.

Thank you.
Catherine

[aberdeensecretaries]

Caths17

Firstly welcome to The Hub - look forward to seeing you posting more - good fun postings to add to right now too.

As for business letters, in the UK - as far as I'm aware, and what I've always done is:

Mr Smith
Snow Company
17 Winter Park
LONDON
TH3 P1TS

Beginning with:
Dear Mr Smith

Ending with:
Yours sincerely


or:

Attention (or FAO...for the attention of) Mr Smith

Snow Company
17 Winter Park
LONDON
TH3 P1TS

Beginning with:
Dear Sir

Ending with:
Yours faithfully



Hope that helps - but may have just confused you more, in other areas of the world, it may well be different.

Pam  
Peer Moderator


www.Aberdeen-Secretaries.co.uk

[countrigal]

According to the Gregg Reference Manual, the proper way is with the individual's name first, followed by the company name and address.  So Pam was leading you right.

The problem is, if Bossie thinks it should be the other way you might have to do it his/her way just to keep peace.  Heaven knows, I'm doing things wrong here becuase the Director and her staff refuse to believe that their way is not correct/acceptable.

Good luck.  And Welcome to DD!  We hope to see a lot more of you.

CountriGal
Peer Moderator

[elkiedee]

I  work in the legal department of a council in central London - and I prefer the method of addressing that Pam describes

Name
company
address

Dear (name)

It's what I was trained in (I did an LCCI Private Secretary's course)

but it's common for legal letters to be addressed

Firm
Address or DX address

FAO: Name of person

Dear Sirs

I tend to try to reply in the same way they've written to us, eg Dear Sirs - Dear Sirs, Dear Mr Hart - Dear Ms X, Dear Guy - Dear Jane

but we also sign off everything

for Borough Solicitor

and do some other quirky things that relate to old-fashioned local government practices, mixed with old fashioned legal ways, mixed with newer ones as we have a lot of quite young fee earners from New Zealand, Australia and South Africa, who have often acquired more informal working practices.

I'd say go with your boss, so long as details are included to get it to the right place, and grit your teeth if you're not happy

Where I tend to stick my neck out to defend my methods is over headers/page nos on documents - one fee earner kept trying to remove a lot of information and it was much harder to deal with photocopying/faxing her work as it was slower to check things hadn't slipped out of order.

Luci

[Jackie G]

So if the boss is telling you how to write and lay out a letter, do you get to tell him/her how to do his job?

I thought not.  Stand up for yourself.

I had the same situation years ago after a management buyout when the new MD came in one day and told me he didn't like the way the letters were laid out (I had immediately changed to something more modern when the 'old guard' had gone!

So I argued the case that I wasn't about to tell him how to put together an advertising campaign (we were an ad agency!) for our clients as I had no advertising qualifications - what were his secretarial qualifications and could he even operate a keyboard (this is also pre-computers!)

He soon shut up.

{For those of you who don't know me, I can, however, be quite formidable when standing my ground;  if you're not so confident, take a variety of mail you get personally (or in the office, whichever) that you like the way the letters are addressed, and use these are your argument (obviously you're going to exclude the ones done the way bossie does it!!!)

Good luck, let us know how you get on!

Jackie
www.iqps.org
Peer Moderator

[dwreath]

Just a quick note... If you are using window envelopes that show the address in your letter (mailing in the U.S.)  The US Post Service does not want attention lines after the city, state.  You can get a printout from the post office which points out the last thing they want in the address block is the city, state and zip.  You can use this to show your boss what you have found to be the correct way (depending on your relationship with your boss).

D.

[Jackie G]

The postcode (zip) is also the last thing our Post Office want on mail in the UK.

Jackie
www.iqps.org
Peer Moderator